


From A High Place

by MotelsandDiners



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: AU!Reader, Alternate Timelines, Angst, Drug Use, F/M, Flashbacks, Humor, Klaus centric, Overlapping Realities, Slow Burn, Snark and Wit brought you by Klaus and Ben, relationship building
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-01-25 18:30:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 23,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18580165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MotelsandDiners/pseuds/MotelsandDiners
Summary: That which doesn't kill you, just serves to make you bitter. Klaus never got that memo, he was riding a forty minute high on the bathroom floor of a 7-Eleven before most people are even awake for morning coffee. Klaus never got much of anything through the haze of drug-induced inebriation, and brushed most everything strange off as drug residue tap-dancing along his senses like a well-to-do ne'er do well. This time around he can't dismiss the weird as magical drug fairy dust, and it just might be the one thing he needs to get his life in a general direction of the word 'good'.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've got a playlist for this on Spotify for anyone curious enough. The playlist is called Klaus H. by CasualAesthetic

_From here the sounds of the city are far removed from this silent conversation of shared nicotine and curious glances, shifting muscles of thighs and jolting throats around nervous swallows. The wind is a gentle balm to the thrumming hum of alcohol warmed skin, and a reprieve to the buzz of anticipation brought on by too much patience mixed with fear._

_The metal roof of the broken down school bus they lay upon is just enough of a difference to their body temperature that it reminds them other things exist beyond this stop-and-go dance they do without so much as blinking._

_His fingertips bloom with sudden pain and he glances down at his suspended appendage, the burnt-out butt of a cigarette smoking between his index and middle fingers. His nails are painted steel-grey, chipping color from everyday activities and from his own anxious habits. He flicks the shriveling filter off to the side, his last distraction going up in metaphorical flames because the bottle of honey whiskey the two of you were sharing ran out half an hour ago._

_“Klaus,”_

_What is it, about the way you say his name that makes his spine tingle, his heart jolt, and his stomach fall away? You’ve got a mainline to the softest parts of him that ooze humanity brought to the edge of brutality and savaged beyond salvation, and you don’t turn away from anything you see. He wishes he were half as brave as you: he’d kill for an ounce of your courage._

_“Hm?” That’s as eloquent as he can be, he’s too worried about what might go wrong to think of actual words to give you._

_“I’m leaving for Europe next month.”_

_A headrush, the world tilts and all the alcohol in his stomach sloshes haphazardly- he’s sat up too fast. He slaps one hand to the cold roof, the other to his forehead, cupping it there, “Leaving?”_

_You’re up too, one of your hands laying timidly upon his shoulder, “Yeah, I got a job offer.”_

_“I’ve got an offer,” he says, pistol-quick because now his nervous system has become just that- nervous. His brain has gone whiteboard blank, “Don’t go and I’ll give it all up.”_

_Well, Hell._

_Your fingers are warm, soft as they curl around his wrist and bare his face to you. “Or…you give it up and I take you with me.”_

_He blinks at you, blinks hard. “You…don’t have money for another plane ticket-”_

_Your smile blots out the radiance of the moon, “I told them I had a few conditions.”_

_“Shit. Shit- yeah, ok.” He’s nodding, hair bouncing, gaze riveted on your hopeful expression. “But I can’t go to rehab, not if we’re due to leave in a month…” He grips your biceps, skin prematurely clammy because he’s already thinking of what lies ahead._

_“Cold turkey, Hargreeves?” You ask, swallowing thickly, heart aching. He’s so desperate to keep you his own well-being takes a back seat._

_He dawns a wobbly smile, puts a spark in his own eyes through sheer willpower, “Gonna need to buy some rope, Sunshine.”_

_You shake your head, fighting a laugh. “Sounds kinky. I’m game.”_

_Before he can backtrack to something docile, he pulls you into a hug. “Don’t get too excited. We’ll take turns.”_

**BANG!**

Klaus bolts upright, sucking a lungful of air in through his mouth. For a good minute he’s unaware of anything beyond his breathing process and the abrupt lurch it’s taken into panic. His automatic response to waking up is to get going, to search and hunt for his next fix and that’s what he’s doing before he’s assessed his surroundings, his legs nearly giving out on him.

He’s breathing the stale flavor of a cheap cigarette, a brand he never smokes, and his mind is muddy, as if he’s spent these unconscious hours drinking instead of sleeping. He grabs a handful of his hair and stumbles blindly toward a light, wincing into it.

He can’t remember where he fell asleep last night, he can’t even remember the last time he _slept,_ let alone dreamt.

But he can recall a laugh, a sound so light and genuinely carefree he hurts for it. He tastes honey on the tip of his tongue, steps out of the tunneled archway of a boulevard into the growing light of early morning and tips his head skyward.

“Europe,” The word falls off his lips like a half-thought plan for dinner, and it leaves him just as unsatisfied, wanting for an explanation and for the fullness of the feeling that swirls around him tauntingly, just out of reach.

“We’ve never been to Europe,” Ben notes dully. He waits a moment, “Who’s Y/N? Said her name a whole bunch before you woke up.”

Klaus waves a hand dismissively, lacking fervor. “Never heard of her.” But he knows your face. Despite the solid fact that he’s never met you in his life.

Ben stares at Klaus’ back sternly, stubbornly. “Something happened.”

Klaus groans, “Yeah, I had a weird dream! Sue me- God,” He moans, bending at the waist, hands on his knees, “It’s too early to be awake. To be alive.”

“No, over there.”

The sudden gravity of Ben’s tone is just enough to break through Klaus’ cocoon of _woe is me_ , and he turns apprehensively to take heed of his ghost brother’s outstretched arm.

Some 50 feet away, in a white stone diamond shaped courtyard is a sight quite out of place. The statue of a fountain has been obliterated, the head of some unknown pioneer lays face up in the middle of the street, blank eyes and features upturned toward the heavens in silent abdication. The body, the body is elsewhere, in bits.

The fountain, whereupon the statue once stood stalwart, is ruined, crushed and broken under the hulking weight of a-

“Bus,” Klaus mumbles, hand swiping listlessly, in disbelief, because he should have some sort of response, right?

The wheel ports are empty, some of the windows are busted, the frame is rusted, the back door is completely missing, and the folding door is bent inward, rendering it useless.

Oh, there his legs go again, moving. How about that?

“Wait, are we actually going?” Ben watches Klaus pass him, feeling that niggling itch that something is being hidden from him. Ironic.

“A broken-down bus. Honey whiskey. Cheap cigarettes. Sunshine.” They tumble off his tongue like hot coals, leaving a pain behind that lacks the heat of something real. “Nail polish. Burned fingertips. Sunshine. Europe.”

He appears damn near crazy, stumbling on shaky legs, eyes glassy but pinned to a school bus that’s just as broken as he is and only slightly less used and abused. He’s mumbling incoherently, heedless of the people that are starting to flock to this strange sight same as him.

Ben is hot on his tail, more curious about his brother’s behavior than the actual phenomenon at hand.

Klaus stops short at the back of the bus, getting hit with a strange sense of déjà vu and nostalgia all lovingly wrapped up in the form of a sudden migraine that hits him as softly as a cinderblock. His shoes are soaked in the fountain, and his vision spins blurry, but he hauls himself inside the empty bus, scraping his knees on the dirty floor.

_“Klaus, did you bring the ladder?”_

A voice he’s heard once, but could pick out of a crowd of thousands twines in his ears like silken thread. He isn’t assailed by the dead, this isn’t that. This is-

_“Nope. Sure didn’t.”_

Not that. He hears his own voice rattle around the cab of the bus, fractured and fluctuating in volume.

Klaus propels himself forward, using the seats as anchors and launching boards until he’s under the rooftop escape hatch looking up into the waking sky with an expression far too fond to be upon his face.

“What is it?” Ben asks, hands tucked into pockets, face scrunched in confusion. “You having a stroke?”

He clambers up, standing on a seat for an extra boost. Pure curiosity and misplaced regret are his inspiration to get to the roof, they work well enough. Of course- “A ladder would’ve worked better.” He notes, out of breath, half in, half out of the bus, legs kicking.

“Or, you know, some muscle on those arms.” Ben remarks, sitting cross-legged in front of Klaus on the roof, smiling.

“Piss off, Tentacle Porn!” He hisses, army crawling his way through his ghostly sibling to collapse on his stomach, sighing.

“So…” Ben quirks an eyebrow, “About that dream you want me to sue you for…”

Klaus groans, “Don’t you have some other clairvoyant to haunt?”

“I do, but not until 4,” Ben snarks lightly. “I don’t think it was a dream.”

Klaus laughs breathlessly, sarcastically, and rockets to his knees, “No shit.” He finds what he’s simultaneously looking and not looking for relatively easy: Cigarette butts burned down to the very filter and shriveled. And caps, caps from bottles of beer and whiskey and vodka and who knows what else?

“Hey, Klaus.” Ben calls over his shoulder. He’s crouched on the other side of the escape hatch, back to Klaus.

“What? You find a bottle with some go juice left in it? Please say yes!” Klaus whines half-heartedly, matching his palms in a weak imitation of prayer.

But no dice, he knows this before he reaches Ben’s side, knew it before he asked. Old habits, and all that.

Another dose of déjà vu, and soul-tearing nostalgia rocks him stupid as he takes in the sight before him.

Spray paint, years old, soaked into the metal. An umbrella stares at them both, colored black. Underneath, in a color too bright to characterize himself, is Klaus’ name signed in elegant looping scrawl. Beside his name, in script that’s tight and precise- impressive given that spray paint is a fickle mistress -is one he’s just recently learned, one he wants to say but won’t.

So, he goes the next best route. “Sunshine.”

“Sun-” Ben cuts himself off when Klaus walks right through him and slides off the side of the bus. “Where are you going?” He yells, standing to his feet and seeing Klaus take off running in a seemingly random direction.

Klaus doesn’t reply, he’s got a destination in mind, vaguely, chasing the ghost of a feeling he’s never owned, mumbling meaningless words like a mantra that will save him. “Whiskey. Europe. Sunshine.”

He’s breathing cheap nicotine on every inhale and tasting the sweetest bite of honey on the edges of his teeth. It’s an opiate and a razor blade wrapped together with the softest ribbon, appearing to him as harmless as a stuffed bear.

He’s running down the streets, putting distance behind not for the sake of leaving, but for the need of finding something and the horizon has never looked so promising. Tomorrow has never been so far away, but so unimportant. Ghosts are on his heels, reaching for him, falling heinously short of success because the drugs make him a tourist in a foreign country.

He’s running for Europe. He’s running for cheap cigarettes and honey whiskey. He’s running for Sunshine.

Most his life he’s spent trying to escape, escape his mind, escape his past, escape the dead, escape the living, escape life itself.

He’s got your name on his tongue, and it feels like freedom. It feels like a secret of golden proportions and he’s never had something to covet.

He’s breathing cheap cigarettes and honey whiskey, and he’s never breathed better.

_A studio apartment with bay windows and archways, hanging plants, and furry rugs, string lights, and too many ashtrays, not enough cigarettes. Crisp sheets and strong coffee, fluffy pancakes and sweet strawberries. Potted plants in windowsills, a foreground to foggy panes. An island counter housing two mugs and countless black and white photos._

_Armchairs decorated with carelessly thrown blankets, and end tables holding candles that have never been lit. Jackets on coat racks, shirts tossed onto the bed. Books here and there, not opened but read. Pictures on the walls, familiar stills of the city. Record player in the corner by the window. A phone on the wall, unplugged. A corkboard in the kitchen, dates held in place by thumbtacks._

He’s chasing something he’s never had: a home. And he doesn’t care that it might not exist. Doesn’t care that all the drugs he’s done might have finally fried his brain and he’s just gone crazy. Doesn’t care. Not one bit. He’ll take the possibility of a ridiculous fantasy rather than the bleak reality of every day. He’s prepared for the let-down, but he’ll ride the high as long as he can before the inevitable crash.

The apartment is on the other side of the city, and he won’t stop until he gets there.

“Whiskey. Europe. Sunshine.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All roads lead to home, except when you don't have a home, and when that home belongs in another reality altogether. Oh, well, normal's overrated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs I listened to for this chapter: Still Alive by Half Alive, Aawake at Night by Half Alive, Technicolour Beat by Oh Wonder

_The city is on the brink of slumber, held in the sway of fading sun and the luminance of street lights and headlights and all manner of artificial brightness- the stars fight for a place among the bustle of modernity. The rush of traffic is distorted from so high up, honking horns from four blocks away sound more like an afterthought rather than intentional anger directed at another driver. The hiss of tires on tarmac is a whisper you have to strain to hear, a never-ending secret that doesn’t quite get acknowledged._

_As open as the rooftop is, it’s also a hidden alcove from the humdrum and practiced chaos of city-life and the agents that tote it around like satchels swinging from shoulders. Up here it’s just a blanket and a plastic box of junkfood that keeps the two worlds separate._

_The blanket has been abandoned- well before the sun touched the horizon -for the ledge of the roof. The view is better from there, and there’s something so carefully dangerous about dangling your legs off the edge of a tall surface._

_He’s shoulder to shoulder with you, an unlit cigarette balanced between his fingers, hand laying on his thigh…his catlike eyes are trained on the vanishing point of a street, pupils reflecting the glow of taillights._

_His eyes, usually hazy and heavy, are clear as day, lighter in color and as focused as they’ve ever been. Four days, four tortuous days of detoxing all that poison from his body, letting the world seep back in minute by painful minute- you were always right there, in front of him, in full-view. The delirium was the worst the second day: he couldn’t tell what was real, what was a hallucination- he didn’t know if the thoughts in his head were his or if it was pain talking. And then he couldn’t keep those thoughts to himself- Jesus, the things he said._

_His eyes drop, scale the length of your legs and their gentle movements, sneakers tapping the side of the building…His lids slide closed._

_The things he screamed at you- the names he called you -his fingers twitch, the cigarette slips from his grip and plummets to the street below. He doesn’t lament its death. Instead, he tosses his lighter after it and doesn’t watch that either._

_“You know, I’m holding you to it,”_

_It’s the first thing that’s broken the silence since he stepped out of the bathroom 2 hours ago, freshly showered. You’d had the box in your arms, blanket thrown over it, and said, “Picnic?” What, like he was going to say no? Not to you._

_Klaus swallows thickly and steels himself to look at you. “Holding me to what?” He can’t remember a lot from his four day stint of detox, but he does remember everything he said to you, every horrible thing: all the things you’ve told him over the years, all those insecurities and nagging burdens you vented to him about…ah, and he used it all like weaponry in a weak bid to get out of the ropes holding him pliant. You should’ve duct-taped his mouth._

_Your profile is so serene, so peaceful- he turns his head away, looking at the city instead._

_“You said we’d take turns with the rope,” You smirk to yourself, and reach around for the glass bottles of cherry soda you’d bought while Klaus was in the bath. “I’m still waiting.” You offer one to him, smiling freely, pointing your countenance towards the city because you can sense his apprehensive mood._

_He accepts the cold bottle slowly, glass dripping condensation…he holds a moment too long, staring just a little too hard at a tailor-made gesture of forgiveness and acceptance that has become your habit and something he expects and dreads from you all at once._

_He unscrews the cap, releasing a hiss that sounds vaguely like a sigh from the bottle. And then he does the same, sighs, expels the emotion bottled within him before he bursts._

_You chuckle softly, “Suppose we can save it for Europe,” You tip your bottle toward him for a toast, and he taps the neck of his soda against yours, his eyes boring into your own. “You’re worth the wait.” You wink at him, grinning broadly. The banter comes easy, even coming from a place of truth, but that’s how it always been: the two of you putting on full display what you feel, but keeping a respectful, painful, distance._

_It’s a truth that doesn’t need to be said, but could change everything once spoken._

_He hasn’t taken a drink, and he doesn’t intend to. He sets the bottle down behind him, catching your attention, you’ve barely swallowed your drink, he hears you ‘Hm?’ at him and doesn’t take a moment to think before he’s got a hand curled around the side of your neck, pulling you to him._

_There’s no build-up, no apology on the tip of his tongue, just gratitude as he feels your exhale flutter across his mouth, he can feel a question lingering on your lips, and he smothers it fervently, in the softest way he knows how. He tastes cherry on your tongue, his new high, and chases it like the freedom he’s been cheated out of for years._

_You drop your bottle, glass clattering loudly on the roof, cherry soda spilling out of the thin neck to paint the concrete a foamy pink. It’s automatic the way you grasp him, desperation mixed with affection. Desperation: Your hand curls tightly in the soft fabric of the t-shirt he’s wearing, tugging unconsciously. Affection: Your other tunnels through his hair to hold the base of his skull, tender and sweet._

_All the things he could say never make it to verbal conception, he’s touched starved and feasting. Everything’s always been out of reach by maddening inches, kept muddied and repulsive by the drugs he’d pollute his bloodstream with. He wanted nothing, felt nothing except high, and then low. Just a change in altitude, not attitude._

_The world is open to him now, tactile and new and raw, and he’s ready to let it in._

 

This hallway is familiar in a way that makes his stomach lurch with approaching nausea, a biological warning for a let-down. He’s never set foot in this apartment building, but he’s gotten all the way to the third floor seamlessly, his mind on autopilot as snapshots of a life he hasn’t lived have flipped before his eyes. Emotions rolling over him with such genuineness he’s just left drained afterwards.

Sea green faded carpet stretching the long hallway, sconces on the walls, doors painted white, apartment numbers screwed into the wall on bronze plates.

It stares at him, so innocent and unfeeling, reflecting the glow of overhead lighting. The apartment door is wide open, inviting silently, gaping and macabre.

_The phone on the wall next to the door is red, and unplugged,_ He thinks, taking that first tentative plunge and crossing the threshold. The flat is dark, lights off, but he can sense that something is wrong, sense that _everything_ is wrong about this apartment and his place in it.

The wall is empty. Instead of a phone, a rack for keys hangs at eye-level. He can get a glimpse of the kitchen from here, the island that was habitually overflowing with photos and notebook paper housing short poems and idle thought penned down in a frenzy.

The counter is clean, nothing on it aside from a potted plant.

He ventures quietly into the kitchen, breathing shakily, trying to get some semblance of a memory. The apartment should smell like fading cigarette smoke, coffee and rain because the windows were always cracked open, no matter the temperature outside. But it just smells like fresh linen and citrus cleaning supplies; Sterile, as if the apartment isn’t lived in.

The pile of mail in front of the door, he’s sure, is just there to prove him wrong. Klaus plants his hands on the edge of the counter and leans into it. It’s so quiet he can hear the sad thud of his own heart.

Which is why the whisper of fabric on the far side of the room draws his attention like a gunshot. The curtains are pulled closed, but one is in the process of being drawn back. For a moment, there’s panic in his blood: he’s trespassing, and the person that lives here will notice him and flip out.

Not how he wants to spend his morning.

And in the next moment there’s a new kind of panic gripping him.

He knows that profile, knows that silhouette like he knows the pointy end of a needle. Klaus turns, breath held like a stone in his chest-

_“This isn’t a joke?” He asks, staring down at the clunky camera in his hands, skeptically, confused._

_“Nope.” You’re stretched languidly along an armchair, journal propped open on a thigh and chewing on the cap of a pen. “You need something to do, I’ve seen how badly your hands shake when you’re not doing anything. Besides, one of us needs to take pictures of Europe.”_

_His lips stretch wide, sanguine. “I can think of other things to photograph.”_

_You roll your eyes, “I know you can. Which is why I kept the rope.”_

_He stops fiddling with the buttons and looks up at you sharply, “What?”_

Klaus bites down a weak chuckle, puts a hand over his mouth and tries to choose between fight or flight. But much like the rest of his life, he has no say and the decision gets made for him.

He sees you turn, watches your body freeze, stiffen to corpse-like proportions. And then that curtain falls closed and you’re rushing toward him.

“Klaus?!”

God, the alarm, the fear, the desperation and relief and all manner of emotions that coat his name as it rolls off your lips in a watery gasp makes his stomach clench. He isn’t sure why, but he steps toward you, just a step, but it feels like a step in the direction. The first thing he’s done in decades that he doesn’t immediately regret.

You slam into him like a bat out of Hell, hands clawing at his back in a desperate embrace, and he’s shell-shocked. Klaus has never had someone touch him in an attempt to get him to stay longer, usually he’s just being pushed- pushed out of bars, out of clubs, out of stores, out of rehab, out of the house.

He wants that, he wants the truth behind the warmth of your palms, the relief of your ragged breathing and the way you melt into him so easily it should come with a warning.

He doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know where to go, doesn’t know why he wants to burst into tears and drown the sobs against your mouth, but God does he.

“What’s happening?” You wonder aloud in his shoulder, “The apartment- it’s…it’s _wrong._ Everything is.”

He closes his eyes. Yeah, everything is wrong. Most of all: him. “I don’t know.” His hands, that grabbed you without his volition, fall away. It’s wrong, you just confirmed it. Whoever you think he is, he isn’t. These memories and feelings he’s been carrying aren’t his own.

You rub your cheek into the fur of his coat, it smells of rain and the subway. It gives you pause, “Didn’t you toss this out years ago?” You pluck at the material emphatically.

“Toss it? Why would I?” A simple enough series of questions, but it sets something off, and suddenly you’re two feet away from him like he’s on fire, and staring at him like he’s grown three heads.

Your eyes rove him, critically, so sharply he actually feels a little self-conscious.

No nail polish on his fingers, his ears aren’t pierced, he isn’t wearing that moon pendant necklace-

The realization dawns on you. “You’re not him.”

Klaus has never heard a sentence uttered with such horror and heartbreak. No clarification needed, he knows who you mean. “No, I’m not.” He watches your eyes brim, watches them pool over…he glances around the apartment. “But I know this place. I- I know-”

You hold up a hand, cutting him off. “You don’t. I don’t belong here, I need to get back. Can you take me to your academy?”

Ew.

Klaus’ face scrunches, and suddenly, he’s not bogged down by this strange reunion. He pulls a rolled joint from a case in his coat, and huffs, “What the Hell for?” He pats his pockets for his lighter.

You swallow thickly, “I need to talk to Five. He’d be the only one that could possibly send me back to-” Now you stop; the look he gives you…it’s like he’s about to deliver an unwarranted death sentence on you.

“The kid’s been gone close to twenty years, the lucky bastard,” Klaus checks his inside pockets. Empty. “If I were him, I wouldn’t come back either.” He looks around the kitchen; there’s gotta be a lighter in here somewhere, or at least a box of matches, right?

“Gone?” you murmur, feeling a metaphorical rug get pulled out from underneath you.

He nods, “Mm. We think he time traveled. Got stuck.” He’s just moved to start pulling out drawers when you pull a lighter from your own jacket pocket.

Odd. He has- _had_  -one just like it. The flame jumps to life, illuminating your strained expression and the tears clinging to your lower lids.

Klaus stoops to light the end of his joint, dim kohl-rimmed eyes locked on yours. It isn’t normal: how much he wants to touch you, and how much doing nothing and doing the very thing he wants would hurt both of you.

He inhales deeply. The lighter goes out, and he loses sight of your eyes. He can breathe. “Well, I can still take you to the Academy. But I’m not going in.”

A sarcastic laugh falls out of you. “Good to know some things never change,” You sigh and make for the front door. “But there’s no point if Five is gone.”

Klaus takes another deep breath…glares down at his joint, his fingers, glares at this alien apartment and stubs it out on the immaculate counter, burning it.

You’re already gone, and he wonders if this is how the dead feel.

He hasn’t eaten in days, he should probably drink some water, he certainly needs sleep, and a shower couldn’t hurt, but all he cares for in this moment-

“Wait!” He yells and rushes out into the hallway, gangly limbs adding comedic effect to the simple act. You’re making quick time out of the building, and he restrains himself from flat-out running. “Hold on!” There’s just a little panic in his voice, and it prompts you to stop. He wonders if you’re just that nice or if there’s another reason.

“You can’t help me,” You tell him, as if in accusation and in apology. He’s standing too close but he doesn’t know that: you can see it in his eyes.

“You can’t know that,” He retorts, clears his throat, “You’re just as lost and confused as I am, and you aren’t even a junkie.”

“You realize you just insulted yourself?” You swing the door to the stairwell open and slip through.

“That’s not an insult,” He scoffs, right on your heels. “Anyway, what are you going to do?”

“Become a junkie.” You snap weakly, watching your shoes traverse stairs.

“One out of ten would not recommend.” Klaus quips, almost shoulder-to-shoulder with you.

“What do you know?” You ask him, and realize how vague that sounds. You sigh, “About what’s happening?”

He hops down four steps and stands in front of you on the landing. “Not a damn thing.” He smiles. “But I’ve got this mantra inside my head that doesn’t make any sense to me,”

You run a hand through your hair and give him a tired look, “I forgot how exhausting you are as a junkie.”

Klaus frowns. “Forgot?”

You shake your head, wave a hand, and meet his cat-like eyes with painful reluctance. “What’s this about a mantra?”

A smile quirks his mouth, crooked and carefree, “Whiskey. Europe. Sunshine.”

He’s not prepared for your response. The blood drains from your face, and goes expressionless as a statue. In the next moment, before he can ask if you’re okay, you’re crumpling against the wall, sobbing uncontrollably, curled up on cold, unforgiving stairs.

Your cries echo through all five floors, and Klaus can say with infallible certainty: it’s the most haunting sound he’s ever heard.

He doesn’t know what to do, he takes two steps toward you, stops, and half-crouches on the stairs. Klaus reaches out a tentative hand that hovers uncertainly above your shin. He doesn’t touch you, he has this intuition that it would make the situation worse rather than better.

But he doesn’t want to listen to you cry, either. He can’t get himself to leave, though. So, he climbs two more stairs, and sits beside you, legs stretched out, elbows planted behind him just a couple of stairs higher and tilts his head back to wait.

He’s never been good around crying people. Never really been a good comforter.

“Klaus!”

Ah, there’s Ben, he’ll know what to do.

“You can’t run off like that, you tweaked out dumbass- you could’ve been hit-” Ben stops short, taking note of you crying into the stairs like you’re dying slowly. And then he’s looking at Klaus all stretched out and content, appearing just the least bit uncomfortable… “What the Hell did you do?”

“Me?” Klaus is aghast. He puts a hand over his heart, “ _Me?_ Dear, Benji, I am the epitome of perfect. I’ve done nothing wrong, ever, in my life.”

“You’re a human disaster.” You and Ben say in almost perfect unison, your breathing is choppy and cuts your words into hiccups.

Klaus throws his hands into the air, blows a raspberry. “Everyone’s a critic.” He stands with a groan and stumbles towards the corner of the 2nd floor landing.

You wipe your eyes, sniffle. “What are you doing?”

“Answering a call of nature.” _Ziiip._

You cock your head, watching a stream of urine run down the corner of the wall, unimpressed and very much disappointed. “Human. Disaster.” You repeat.

Ben nods, unseen. “The worst.”

Seeing the slightest advantage, you wobble to your feet and shakily continue on your way down the stairs.

Klaus looks over his shoulder at the sound of your boots tip-tapping on the concrete and his eyes widen. “Wait! Don’t run!” He hastily tucks himself and goes after you, albeit a little slower.

“Stop following me,” You call over your shoulder, taking the stairs two at a time. You chance a look over your shoulder and find him doing an awkward crab-like walk down the stairs: The zipper on his jeans is stuck. “God.”

“Don’t make me say it again,” He threatens, glaring at his crotch but directing both the statement and his expression toward you. When you pick up your pace, he yells down the stairwell, “Whiskey! Europe! Sunshine!”

There’s an exit that leads to the alleyway at the back of the first floor and you take it, jogging down the cramped by-way. You’re just at the end when you hear the door creak open, and you glance behind you in trepidation.

He gets points for persistence, you suppose, but- …he hasn’t zipped himself up.

“Oh, my God.” You wheeze. He runs after you, down the long alley, and you stay where you are because it’s obvious, he isn’t going to stop chasing you, and because- “Your dick is out, you know?”

“Whose fault is that, hm?” He has the audacity to ask, hands on his hips, not a care in the world.

Jesus Christ.  “Make yourself presentable.” You order with a roll of your eyes. “We’re getting breakfast.”

He looks down at himself, looks back at you. “Maybe I could get us a discount, huh?” He waggles his eyebrows- “No, wait. I’m sorry!” You stomp off down the street and he’s once again trying to tuck himself back into his pants with fervent effort.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tramadol for your thoughts?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Waffles, or bacon and eggs? Neither, as it turns out. Why is that serious sit-downs have to happen over food? Ruins the food, if you ask him. But you're not asking him how his breakfast is, because you have your priorities in order.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOHBOY, I've so many feels for Klaus it's dangerous. Also, if the mood suits you, I'd suggest listening to some Arctic Monkeys (acoustic versions) with rain. You're welcome.

He’s ordered himself a coffee, loaded to diabetic proportions with cream and sugar, you cringed as he doctored it to his liking- _your_ Klaus liked his coffee strong and bitter -wearing a small smile. Klaus hasn’t spoken a word beyond telling the waitress his drink preference; his menu is open but not looked at and that makes something in the back of your mind turn like the cogs of a clock: You and your Klaus would get breakfast here 5 times a week…

Klaus has spent the last few minutes tapping his anxious fingers on hot porcelain and glancing at you overtly. There have been threadbare moments where he’s paused, expression hardening with gravitas, mouth opening to speak but he’s retreated each time.

You’re trying-and failing -not to look at him. It’s just macabre to be sitting across from this version of Klaus that you know nothing about. This one is jumpy, rambunctious, tries too hard to smile, is almost walking the line of child-like with the way he’s followed you. Appearance wise, this version of Klaus’ hair is short, shorter than you’re used to seeing; his natural curls are practically nonexistent. Once again, you can’t help but notice his naked ears, vacant of silver round studs, void of that eggplant purple helix piercing.

There are no handmade bracelets of wooden beads and braided rope adorning his wrists, no nail polish. No moon pendant gracing his neck. It’s like you’re looking at a blank version of the Klaus you lived half your life with.

You sigh heavily and lean back in your seat, raking your hands through your hair as you do so. You can’t even think about food. There are so many emotions taking residence in your stomach there’s no room for bacon and eggs.

“Can I ask a question?” He finally works himself up to talk. He said ‘a question’, but truth be told he hasn’t landed on one, he’s got so many spinning around his brain he feels dizzy.

“No, you can’t borrow twenty dollars.” You deadpan, shaking your head. You open your menu, if nothing else than for an excuse to draw your eyes away from him.

Klaus purses his lips; his fingers continue their inconsistent tapping on the mug. He’s in too deep in waters he doesn’t know how to tread safely. For a reason he can’t pinpoint he’s expecting you to treat him differently: like he’s more than his drug addiction and fear of the dead. He’s expecting you to look passed his haggard appearance, the bags under his eyes, the jitters in his limbs- He’s counting on you to look at _him._ Just Klaus. Not Klaus the junkie, or Klaus No. 4, or the attention hog, the list goes on.

He’s been silent too long, now it looks like he’s taken offense. Which he might have, a little.

You glance at him, quickly and take stock of the brittle line of his mouth. He’s different, but you can read him just the same. “Sorry. Ask away.”

His eyebrows jolt. An apology? Has he ever gotten one of those? From anyone? He doesn’t think so. “You said that you don’t belong here. What did you mean?”

Ah, the million-dollar question. You rub at your jaw, “You seem to grasp that I know you in a vague sense, but not intimately. Like someone can recognize the different rooms of a person’s house without knowing exactly what furniture is in each room.”

Klaus squints, but nods. “Yes, I follow…” He takes a sip of his too-sweet coffee, shooting a quick glare at Ben whose expression blatantly says _Do you?_

“Simply put, I’m from a different house.”

Klaus sighs, grimaces in thought. “Houses in this analogy, I assume, serve as realities?”

Ben gawks. “Shit. Did I just fall into an alternate reality where you aren’t an idiot?”

Klaus openly flips off the vacant seat next to you, earning an odd look from your approaching waitress.

You let a small smirk pull your lips. You were no stranger to one-party arguments and fights: Until your Klaus got a handle on his abilities, you’d constantly hear one end of a conversation, or out of context insults in the middle of a quiet meal. For those who didn’t know better, Klaus appeared schizophrenic.

“Do- do we need another minute to decide?” Your waitress asks uncertainly, pencil poised loosely above her notepad.

Klaus glares harshly at the opposite booth, too caught up in whatever Ben is saying or doing to pay any attention to the waitress.

Oh, the good ol’ days, you think with a roll of your eyes. “He’ll have the number eight, I’ll have the number four, both with a side of bacon.” You hand her both your menus- Klaus is staring out the window, frowning -and bite down a smile. “Thank you.”

When she disappears into the kitchen, you knock your knuckles on the tabletop, making Klaus jump. “Any other questions?”

 His mossy greens lock on you, swimming with momentary confusion. “What did you order for me?”

Ben’s expression falls flatly. “Is that really important?”

Your own expression mirrors his, unknown to you. “You’ll see. My turn to ask a question.”

Klaus’ shoulders droop with boredom. “Oh, this is so much fun! So glad I decided to follow you- almost lost my dick for it.” Unceremoniously, he frees a small handful of nondescript blue tablets from his coat and tosses them into his mouth.

What a rush of déjà vu watching him do that. How many years- how many pills and how many overdoses did you witness? How many calls from the hospital woke you in the early am? How many sobriety tokens did you keep for him, knowing he’ll kill that streak the day after?

“Hey,” Klaus washes it all down with a drink of coffee, and wonders at your sudden somber, heartbroken regard of him. “You alright? Don’t start crying again,” He clamps his coat tighter around his middle, leans toward you, “Please.” He adds for good measure, as if that’s the cure-all for oncoming tears.

You chuckle weakly, shake your head. “I’m fine,” That isn’t remotely true, but the obvious doesn’t need to be said. “You said you knew the apartment, and you acknowledged that you aren’t who I thought you were. How did you know?”

Klaus blinks his gaze away, down to the table, where he doesn’t have to meet eyes awash with grief and loneliness. “It started with a dream. That’s when I first-” he hums, not sure what word to use: Met? Learned? He didn’t meet you until the apartment. He shrugs, “There was a school bus. You and he were talking about Europe.”

You nod numbly, remembering. “He wanted to go. He chose between me and-”

“Drugs.” Klaus finishes softly, dropping his head to gather himself. The pills he took are starting to kick in. He could laugh at the irony, but there’s a knot in his throat that could turn it all into tears, and he saves crying for the bathtub. “After that…I’ve been awake, and it’s like I have movies playing in my head of all these things I’ve done- another life, but…”

“It isn’t you.” You say patiently, clasping your hands together atop the table. Still, it doesn’t exactly make sense that he’s getting snapshots and five-minute compilations of a life you lived with someone else.

He shifts in his seat, resettles his shoulders, squares them for another question. “How did you get here?” There’s a part of him that wants you to go back to wherever it is you came from: you’re a spanner in the works, you’ve turned the dial of crazy up on his life and he doesn’t need any outside help with that, thank you very much.

But there’s also another part of him- and he’s not sure it’s really him -that hopes you won’t be able to go back. You just seem so very much like hope to him, and he wants to treasure that, for however many minutes he can.

You cross your legs and fold your forearms on the table. “An experiment. Went horribly sideways.”

“An experiment.” Klaus repeats, monotone. “That’s vague as shit- what kind of experiment?”

“Time travel- of a sort.” You answer curtly, muscles around your hairline tightening with growing anxiety.

Klaus gapes. And then gawks. And then he laughs, “That’s…wow.” He shakes his head, liberates a cigarette from its shared space with his joints, and then makes a _gimme_ motion with his hand for the lighter you’re carrying.

“In my defense, it did work: the time travel part,” You retort, and slide that blue zippo lighter across the table to him. “It just also sent me to a different universe. Tomato, tuh-mah-toe.”

“Whoopsie daisy, hm?” he shoots back, taking a long pull from his cigarette. “Not that I know shit about shit, but isn’t there a little bit of a difference between time travel, and universe-trotting?”

You smile wanly, tightly. “Just a little.”

He snorts derisively with a roll of his eyes, blinks hard as a wave of mind-rocking euphoria swarms his nervous system. “Sarcasm?”

You nod. “Sarcasm.” Conversation stalls as the diner’s sole coffee pot splutters and spits steam, and cheap metal cutlery clinks on even cheaper porcelain. “Can I ask what you know about me? How much?”

Klaus pauses, end of his cigarette poised at his petal-pink lips as your question assails the finer bits and pieces of his mind. What does he know?

He knows you love to sit on the ledges of tall buildings. You like to sit on the windowsill and watch the rain run down panes. You can’t keep any greenery alive- you’ve managed to kill three succulents, in a one-week period. He knows you prefer baths over showers, you like tea better than coffee, you get a special kind of glee of sliding across hardwood floors in your socks. You’re always in the mood for a late-night walk through the city, you don’t mind the rain, but you will use an umbrella if you’re walking with someone. You like staying up late and waking up early. You love black and white films. And inviting people over for sit-downs. You hate rings from mugs on tables. Your favorite color is green.

He knows you like cooking, breakfast is your favorite. You’ll never turn down a game of cards. You jump in rain puddles, regardless of footwear. He knows- and he shouldn’t -that you prefer to wear oversized t-shirts at home and nothing else. You melt for a firm hold around the back of the neck, get weak in the knees when teeth nibble at your earlobe. You pine for entire days in bed, talking with hands and bodies. Your favorite hold is a hand in his- not _his_ -hair, twisted and pulling at his- _not his_ -hair as you climb that invisible euphoric peak.

Klaus closes his eyes, jaw stiff. “Not a thing. Not a _Goddamn thing._ ” Does he sound bitter? Yes? Good.

He inhales another breath of his cigarette.

Your eyebrows are pinched, wrinkled with perception. _Lying little shit._ You know his tells, even though you shouldn’t. “Hey,” You murmur, and he glances at you from his peripherals, face pointed toward the window and all the activity happening on the other side of it.

You gesture for his cigarette, and he hesitates.

Klaus knows something else about you. He offers up the rest of his cancer stick to you, watching intently as you bring it to your lips.

He knows you don’t smoke. Ever. Unless his mouth has touched the filter. Well, not _his_ …

You tip your head back and blow a thick stream into the vent above you.

The stretch and flex of the muscles in your neck is too appealing…Klaus tears his eyes away.

Ben watches, like he does, with second-hand interest in everything. “Is smoking even allowed in here?”

Actually, no. But Klaus is just macabre enough to ward off complaints and reminders from the staff that smoking is prohibited within the diner. And you’re somewhat conscious of that fact.

The waitress approaches with a tray.

You’re not sure you’re hungry. Mostly you’re just tired, and jaded, and carrying instinctual concern for the health of the man sitting across from you.

Two eggs, sunny-side up stare at you from a tan plate, toast buttered and palatably soft. It looks good.

Klaus stares at his own plate. Four pancakes, topped with strawberries drizzled with strawberry syrup, whipped cream spiraled in a happy puff on it all.

The plate is the wrong color, the pancakes are flatter than he remembers never having. The strawberries are sliced robotically precise, the whipped cream came from a can…

He’s comparing the real to something that’s never existed for him and hating reality for not living up to it. He drops his elbow on the table and rests his cheek in the palm of his hand, stabs his fork into the pile of less-than-fantasy pancakes, and meets your matching look of nostalgia and regret from across the table. Familiar strangers, reminiscing things through expressions and sighs, apologizing with thin smiles.

Klaus bites the inside of his cheek, and tears away some pancake, stabs a strawberry, dips into the cream, and says, “Happy Monday?” holding out his breakfast-tipped fork for a messy toast.

You quirk a melancholy smile and grab a slice of your buttery toast. “Happy Monday.”

Ben slinks down in the corner of the booth, eyes darting between the two of you. “Oh, I can’t wait until Happy Tuesday.”

Once the edible toast is completed, he begins eating, his first real meal in a week. He maintains manners only because you’re the one paying, and because he feels you’d scold him if he were less than human with his table etiquette.

“How did you know I like strawberry pancakes?” he asks around a mouthful, one cheek puffed full of sugary goodness.

You break open one egg, dipping your toast. “Lucky guess,” You pop an eyebrow at him, chew on a smile.

Klaus stares at you, implication and understanding dropping into his slightly hazy green eyes. When you go back to eat, he makes an input. “This place is open seven days a week,”

“You eat here often?”

Klaus drags a strawberry around a puddle of syrup. “About as often as you smoke.”

And then the cutlery stalls abruptly, like the needle scratching on a record. “And how often do I smoke?” You ask, pinning your sharp gaze to the eggs bleeding all over your plate.

Couth, and holding a metaphorical ace up his smothering coat, he lays another cigarette on the table, lays the lighter next to it, and tilts his head, counting all the lines around your anchored eyebrows. “Seven days a week.”

Your fingers tighten on your fork and he sees it, knows you understand the deeper meaning, the unsaid something behind his words. As if to soften the blow, he makes another statement, “We smoke different brands. He could actually afford his,”

Ben frowns, “You could too if you ditched a couple habits.” He’s earned with Klaus sticking his tongue out at him.

“For a while he couldn’t afford anything. He didn’t want any money because he was worried he’d try to spend it on a quick fix,” You remember those shaky days after he got clean, a few months went by and he’d still shove whatever money he made or found into your confused and reluctant hands with pleas and desperate eyes.

Klaus lays his fork down, and scratches at the facial hair on his chin. “You talk about him in the past tense…is he?”

Just one brief moment of eye contact is all it takes for Klaus to understand the truth behind your heartbreak, to understand the relief and desperation of that meeting in the apartment, and how it’s tainted with falsehood because he is not who you were expecting or wanting.

“He’s…” You exhale shakily, swallow thickly and stave off tears with sheer willpower. “Gone.”

Klaus sits a moment in silence, contemplating your grief, your brokenness, the isolation you must feel…He braves a wry smile. “Oh, but don’t you know?” He asks and waits for you to raise your head. “The dead are never really gone.”

Ben nods, matching his wry smile. “Preach, brother!”

Klaus points at the empty seat next to you, brightens his smile. “Even Ben agrees with me. He’s gotta know because he’s more dead than America’s _Can do!_ spirit.”

“That’s rude, Klaus,” You reprimand loosely, and because you aren’t rude, you lean a little in Ben’s direction. “I’m sorry you have to deal with this.” You stare emphatically across the table at Klaus and his carefree smile.

Ben looks at you, shocked. No one’s believed Klaus, or acknowledged that he could actually be around, even knowing Klaus’ ability. He was resigned to the knowledge that Klaus would be the only person who noticed him. Until now.

He pins Klaus with the most serious look in his repertoire. “You follow her. Don’t lose sight of her, ever.”

Klaus huffs, stabs his pancakes with a pout. “You guys are assholes.”

“Cheer up and eat your diabetes, sweetie.” You say, smiling innocently; Ben sports a similar grin, elbows propped and chin resting on his clasped hands.

Klaus smirks, “Pet names already? I knew you were warming up to me.” He winks, popping another mouthful of sugared regret into his mouth.

Happy Monday, indeed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also- also! That visual of Klaus with his cheek resting in a palm, lazily stabbing his fork into a pile of syrupy strawberry pancakes while giving you a sad smile across a weathered diner table? Hotdamn, if I were an artist I'd be all over that. That's my shameless pitch to any of my readers that have an ounce of artistic ability. Not sorry


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stop. Go. Stop. Go. His life has been sliced down into chew-able verbs with the texture of leather. With you thrown into the equation suddenly his life is full of description, and the need for context. He's dying for context in every interaction, every thought he has of you, he needs the "why" behind every word, every glance, every physical jolt. He knows the "why", he just wishes it was explicitly tied to him. But he knows it isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo, in case it isn't obvious: I'm such a hoe for reading between lines, sorry. *Is not actually sorry at all*

People ask what love is, and most say it’s an emotion. To you, it’s a choice. And you’ve stood by that, even surrounded by the confusion of onlookers judging your relationship with Klaus. How could you choose that?

Right now, crammed in the window seat of a suspiciously clean bus, watching this other Klaus filter facial expressions at seemingly nothing, you wish love was just an emotion. Something fleeting, something out of your control because the choice you’re making feels like self-sabotage, and who’s going to save you from you?

His feet are planted flat against the back of the seat in front of him, legs jittery, bouncing. You’re not sure if it’s because of all the sugar, or all the drugs he thinks you didn’t see him take on the way to the bus stop. You remember this journey, the ups and downs, the silences and the near inescapable spirals into depression. You remember the constant worry, the helplessness, you remember the anger (irrational) on both sides. You remember all the times that the two of you would push, dangerously close to breaking something intrinsic beyond repair.

Those nights, where words were bullets and knives and the apartment was a war zone, those nights always ended in deathly silence and tight throats fighting off tears. But you always chose the same thing. Given a million different options you always chose the _exact same thing_.

He’d asked where you were going, and he didn’t just mean _you_ , because he was hot on your heels, wearing a hopeful smile. It wasn’t you, singular. It was you, plural.

You’d had a choice, at the door of the bus, to pay for yourself and only yourself. But you heard his shoes on the steps behind you, could feel his smile on your back, and you made a choice. The same choice you always make.

And now you’ve got to live with it. With him.

You close your eyes and turn your head away, leaning your temple against the cool glass, feeling a headache coming on. Truthfully, you’ve no idea what you’re doing. There’s no anchor in this world for you. All you know and love is somewhere else, it doesn’t exist here.

Klaus watches your profile with keen interest, watches you, when he knows he shouldn’t. He feels, somewhere deep inside him, that he shouldn’t be following you. It’ll only end badly, for one or both of you. As much as he’d like to taste happiness and freedom, he’s not sure he’d like to do so at the expense of someone else.

He knows he should probably take you to Reginald. The crazy old bastard would probably have some semblance of an idea of what to do. But Klaus is being selfish with you, he’s aware of this. He’s half hoping for more displaced memories, little nuggets of information about you and this life he’s never (or could ever) have.

Even on the verge of falling asleep you look sad.

Klaus could ride this bus all day, sit in this same seat and not move, watch the sunlight play across your face, emotions flicker behind closed lids. There’s something so simplistic about this moment he’s having, sitting next to you, close enough to touch, but knowing better. You’re real, but fantastical. He’s only had a ghost at his side for the past ten years or so, and then you show up, dressed as everything he didn’t know he wanted.

He’s sure, in ways he can’t put to words, that you saved this other version of himself. And suddenly he’s angry, angry that he was cheated out of having someone like you to himself. Why was he doomed to become the way he is now? Where has his silver-lining been all these years?

Ben clears his throat, “You look like you’re having a serious think.”

Klaus shakes his head, still frowning, and stares at the seat in front of him. “Nope.”

Ben hums in mocking acknowledgement. “So then I should just ignore the smoke pouring from your ears?”

Klaus spares his specter sibling a glare. “Yes.”

Ben pats the air in defeat, fighting a smile. “Alright, but don’t you think it would be a good idea to learn more about her? How she got here, that experiment?” Ben pauses, “You sure we shouldn’t take her to the old man?”

Klaus stiffens from head to toe. “The last thing anyone on this godforsaken planet needs: to be taken to that selfish prick.”

Ben peers around Klaus to take in your appearance, mainly, the pain etched into your brow. He sighs, “It’s just- she doesn’t belong here. And it’s obvious she’s missing something about where she’s from.”

Klaus glances at you, loathe to regard the discomfort that hugs you like a coat. More loathe to admit he knows it’s a someone you’re missing, and not a something. “We’ll figure it out.” He doesn’t even sound remotely confident of that.

Ben stares at Klaus hard. “What is it about her?”

Klaus doesn’t supply his brother with an answer, despite the irritated look being drilled into the side of his head. Instead, he stares out the window, stealing looks at you as the city rolls by in the background. Silence takes over for a good three miles before Klaus realizes Ben has disappeared.

A bus seat has never felt so comfortable, so infinite to him. He is not in transit to anywhere important, held in sway between point A and point B, he is purposefully still in a mode of relocation that will, inevitably, run out of options. He’ll be forced to make a decision at the city limit if you don’t wake up before then, and he isn’t the least bit tempted to rouse you.

His mind has never been such a dangerous mix of loud and quiet. Quiet where feelings of insecurity and doubt, self-loathing rear their hideous heads…loud where he considers you, and your influence, much like drugs but without a fatal drop-off.

Klaus was more than sorely tempted to part ways with you on the way out of the diner, crawl back into the life he’s known since he was a teenager. Living day-to-day chasing a fleeting high, selling his self worth for consumables all in a pitiable bid to silence his mind and the ghosts of his past. It was familiar, it was easy, he knew how to do it, where to go, who to talk to, how much was too much, and how little was too little. His life was safe in its familiarity, and you terrified him with your uniqueness.

But here he sits beside you on a bus, comparing his own dark bags under tired eyes to yours, and wondering how yours got there. He, of course, wonders how you got here, but not so much as he just wonders _at you_.

Another passenger gets off, another hops on, and he envies their easy transition. Klaus is riveted to his seat, pinned by curiosity, and unwelcome feelings of protectiveness for a near stranger. He’s spent a grand total of twenty minutes actually talking to you, but he knows you better than he knows his own family. He’s held pliantly captive next to you, grazing his eyes along your form, and shying away to look at himself, musing at how different you must see him.

Klaus sighs quietly, and tucks his hands into his lap, fingers twisting and twiddling. He closes his eyes, reluctantly, sure that you’ll disappear when he next opens them, and tells himself to get some sleep. He finds some comfort in the fact that you’d have to literally crawl over him if you wanted to get off the bus.

The hiss of tires on tarmac and the bus engine sighing, the doors whispering open…it’s all a modern lullaby that whisks him off to slumber in a mere minute.

When his breathing evens out, you peel your eyes open and look at him. Look at the strangeness of who he is, this man that you know but haven’t lived a life with. There’s no evidence upon him that you exist in his life. Nothing of what you know can you find on his person.

He’s the blank slate of the Klaus you know and love, and you’re not sure what tears at you more: how laughably distanced you are from home and your heart, or that you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that you are fully capable of falling for this man. You should know. You’ve done it before. You’ve made the decision a thousand times over.

He’s skinny, kept on the dangerous line of underweight and sickly because of his habits. Your mind, loose and tired as it is, conjures a memory for your hands: goose bump littered flesh under your hands, muscles jumping and jittering, _his_ ribcage expanding with shaky breath, bones brittle and ungiving on your palms.

You shake your head, tear your eyes away, and gamble your chances of climbing over the row of seats in front of you without waking him. Taking into account your streak of luck, lately, you deign to stay, against logical judgement. He’s just close enough to how you remember to be appealing, but different enough to stave off regrettable action on your part.

The city has crawled by, block by dismal block, and it’s identical in everything except feeling, much like Klaus. Even so, you find yourself mentally at war, watching your hands twitch at the nearness of him, the dive into the ocean without a safeguard that touching him would be. You know better, sadly for you.

The apartment you lived in- that doesn’t exist here -is far behind you, lost amid all the turns and twists this bus has taken. You’re sure the bus driver is wondering at your immobile state, curious as to whether you’ll ever get off his bus, and you share in his curiosity. This is simultaneously the easiest and most difficult thing you’ve done in a week. It’s very much a placebo effect to be on a vehicle that is constantly in motion when you yourself are going nowhere, giving you the comforting illusion of forward progress.

“Y/N,”

He shouldn’t say your name like that. With such ease. Mouth tight, shoulders just as strained, you wander your eyes up to his face and find him perfectly held in the numbness of sleep still.

You consider what snapshot of your life he’s being treated to now behind those heavy lids, and bristle at the inadvertent invasion of privacy that it is, and how he so readily accepts it.

His expression shifts, molts into something warmer, but restrained and guarded and you bristle even more in your seat. You know that minute crease between his brows, the jaw clenched tight, teeth tucked harshly into the corner of his mouth, tugging the supple flesh of his bottom lip into his mouth…the stiffening thighs, veins straining in his neck.

Your eyes narrow.

Pain blossoms along his jaw, teeth snapping tight- he tastes iron. His legs slip off the seat, and he’s left staring at the open aisle of the bus, cradling his throbbing face, wondering what the Hell just happened. He was having the nicest dream-

Oh.

Cautiously, half anticipating another blow, he turns to look at you. He has a three-part apology on his lips worked out in a second flat, spurred on by your thunderous look and your still tightly clenched fist.

“Klaus Hargreeves.” You say.

Just that. Just his name. And it strikes fear into his heart like he’s never felt in his life, it trumps the mausoleum he was locked in as a child, and that alone tells him what he needs to know about you: you’re over everything. Stronger than his past and his trauma, and brighter than his future will ever be. You overshadow his strife in this moment of quiet fury, and drive out anything that isn’t imperative to making immediate amends.

“In my defense, I could have been dreaming about anything.” His lip stings something awful, and his words come out muffled because he has a hand covering the hurt of his mouth. “But I wasn’t. If it helps, my view was mostly a ceiling- it was more an audio, tactile dream than any-” He near falls out of his seat to avoid your next swing, eyes wide, limbs clumsy and tinged with electricity from adrenaline and fear.

He’s on the aisle seat, palms out, pacifying, grateful that Ben had fucked off to God knows where twenty minutes ago so he can’t witness this. The ammunition his dead brother would have…

Neck and ears warm from embarrassment, you point an accusatory finger at him, more a threat than a blaming tool. “Get up. We’re getting off this bus.”

He nods hastily, standing in a flash and as far away from you as he can get on this cramped bus with its suddenly too small aisle. As you shuffle past him, he licks across his bleeding lip, focusing on the pain and the distinct flavor of ‘not good’ it is on his kink-o-meter. And he adjusts his coat, levers it shut to hide his unapologetically obvious hard-on.

Klaus supposes he should be thankful you punched him: he was just a few more moments away from the glorious end of that dream/memory. He also counts his lucky stars that you aren’t just dumping him somewhere, stranding him alone. Pissed as you are, you’ve told him to come with you. His dick is happy, but his lip is sad.

The time is approaching noon, but he feels exhausted, mentally, emotionally, and now, physically. But he keeps his complaints to himself, gauging the safety to talk based upon the coloration of your neck. Still unarguably pink, so he stays silent, and follows behind, staring at the backs of your shoes and watching globs of dirty gum on the sidewalk pass by.

He would ask where the two of you are going, but he has a strong hunch that you don’t know either. But he’s quite content to follow you anyway, misery does love company. And it’s clear as day that you _are_ miserable. How could you not be?

If even an ounce of these residual emotions he feels pricking at him when he looks at you are real, then you’ve lost something heart-wrenchingly unobtainable. And he’s here, like a dog underneath a dinner table, waiting for scraps to fall, starving and gluttonous, altogether unworthy of whatever he receives.

His feet stop.

The streets are close to empty, an occasional pedestrian bumbling around, glancing in shop windows and dusty glass doors. And he finds himself blending into the disappointing atmosphere, finally caught in that in-between of moving forward and moving on. You haven’t seemed to notice that he isn’t following you, and he doesn’t know if he should be grateful, or if he should be glum about it. No one has ever noticed his absence. No one’s paid enough attention to notice.

As distance increases, so does his anxiety. There you go, taking up the entirety of the sidewalk, stealing his focus…becoming his vanishing point on the horizon. He shouldn’t follow you. You’re a boat, lost at sea and he’s an anchor, dropped at an inopportune moment, jeopardizing your safety and stability.

You don’t want him with you, he knows this. So he stays put, watching your back get smaller and smaller, the gap between the two of you get larger and larger. He’s appropriately disappointed- gutted, actually -when you reach the end of the block and don’t seem to recognize his departure.

He chuckles when you turn for the corner.

And then you don’t turn the corner. Instead, you stop dead and look down the length of the sidewalk at him.

His breathing halts. He should go, turn on his heel and slink back into the city’s underbelly and its grit. Where he belongs. He should. For you. But he finds his feet glued to the pavement.

When your head cocks, and you slip your hands into your jacket pockets, Klaus bites the inside of his cheek.

He figures you’re getting one last look before you rush off and leave him on a street corner; his throat tightens.

But you keep standing there, unmoving, and it takes him far too long to realize: you’re waiting for him to catch up. Vertigo strikes him like a train, as well as soppy gratitude. He’s rocked with disbelief, and scared to trust that you’re genuine.

Your arms lift at your sides, shoulders hiked, _What’s the deal?_

His face tightens. He holds his own arms up, palms out, _I don’t know._ Flops his arms to his sides, _Sorry._ It doesn’t quite hit him that he shouldn’t be able to read your body language that well, nor that you trust he’ll understand your own that well. He could think about it, but he does something far easier: he follows you.

When Klaus reaches you, he hasn’t figured out what he wants his face to show, what he wants to hide. He wonders whether that’s important- if he’s even capable. There’s so much patience on display when he really looks at you, when he steels himself to chip a bit of his wall away and let some of the world in. You’ve walked this road before, he can see that in your eyes: the knowing melancholy, and the tired hope.

He nods at you once, not able to speak. And it’s just as well, there’s nothing to say.

He has to physically stop himself from grabbing your hand: his fingers curl into his palms, nails biting, dangerously close to breaking skin. But it’d be far better to break his skin than to break this growing connection between the two of you because he can’t control himself. He’s never been about control, he’s been about _escaping it_. The only thing he’s been good at.

The city and its hulking hub of skyscrapers is a mere afterthought on the outskirts where the both of you are. He dutifully trails after you, tethering his wants and his questions into the sting of his palms, finding contentment in the peace and quiet you offer and radiate. 

Out here the land is dotted with a few houses, and a couple struggling family businesses interspaced with an almost outrageous amount of trees and honest-to-goodness greenery. A deserted, out of commission school is the last building the two of you pass before it all becomes roads and random alleys overtaken by nature.

He’s no idea where you’re headed until the land starts to incline up, and then his eyebrows furrow with sad recognition. He knows what you’re here for, and he doesn’t know if he wants it to be there, or not. But he can see the abandoned scrap of metal before he crests the top of the hill, and he chokes back a dry laugh.

The school bus.

Once again, his feet stop as you continue onward. This time, it isn’t uncertainty that holds him immobile; It’s respect for you and the memories you’re chasing for a shred of solace. Klaus knows you won’t find any cigarette butts, or empty bottles on the roof. Nor will you find any spray paint.

But you don’t even look. You clamber inside, disappear from his view and then reappear on the roof. No searching, or desperate glances. You just sit and dangle your legs over the side, staring at the city in the distance. Minutes pass as you silently work through your thoughts.

And then you look at him, and pat the roof beside you. A simple invitation. But a loaded gesture.

When he’s situated beside you, he’s struck with a macabre sense of déjà vu: sitting on a rooftop, stealing glances at you. Filled to the brim with guilt as love fights for a place on his emotional roster.

But he’s never sat on a roof with you.

He _is_ filled to the brim with guilt. Because love- which he’s aware he has no right to feel for you - _does_ fight for a place on his emotional roster.

His nails break skin, and he lays his hands in his lap as he quietly gazes at the distant city on top of a school bus with you, trying to remind himself that the two of you are strangers. Just perfect strangers.

Self-sabotage is a science he’s worked into an art form: the city slides from his view, like wet paint on a canvas, as he turns his attention to you instead and ties this moment of quiet introspection to his fragile heart that hides behind a futile cage of bone.

Klaus understands why the other him called you Sunshine. Looking at you makes everything else disappear. Even himself.

His palms bleed, and his eyes pool with salty tears, but he remains, warmed and blinded.

_You be the sun; I’ll be the moon. Just let your light come shining through; and when night comes, just like the moon, I’ll shine the light right back at you._

He’s never read a lick of poetry. So he knows: another little memento from this better life that you lived has taken root inside of him. He won’t intrude, or muse. He’ll stay quiet, and keep your stolen life safe within his silence.

He clasps his bleeding palms together, and makes a promise to himself. One so secret, he buries it deep down with all his other ghosts, replete with coffin and tombstone and funeral procession. He lays it to rest, upturned dirt and a dying flower the only evidence of its existence. He makes himself a promise so bitter and impossible, he kills himself with it.

And then he goes on living.

The city looks beautiful from so far away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How am I doing? Love to hear your thoughts, 'cause mine are getting annoying. Much love to you all, always. <3


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's such a large gap to bridge, and he's sure he doesn't have the materials for such an endeavor. But you make the work look worthwhile, and easy, and that's one of the things that worries him about you: you make everything easier. Now, if only you could somehow make resisting you easier, he'd have next to no complaints.

Instead of letting the silence fill with your thoughts, letting you reminisce about things you can’t change, he talks. About anything, but mostly about himself, because he understands he knows _too much_ about you and you know next to nothing about him. At some point he lays back on the bus roof, watching clouds float by, a small smile quirking his lips, content for the moment.

He’s told you the obvious: about his childhood, or lack thereof. He leaves out the darkest pockets of it, he’s trying to divulge, not cleanse. And he wants to see if he can make you smile. He gives you those fleeting moments of easy sibling comradery, the shenanigans he _had to plan_ because Reginald was a living firewall against fun.

He gives you the CliffsNotes version of all the siblings growing into adulthood: the way they all split off to sail into unknown waters, carried away on the currents of life like sediment, settling into choices of their own making. He’s avoided his own story, aware that it does not need telling, he wears his life.

Klaus has no idea how many of the details and stories he’s told, you already know about. He’s no idea just how parallel his life has been to _your Klaus_ ’. To a point.

It’s almost a toxic mix of relief and gut-wrenching sadness to know that some things were just destined to happen to him, with or without you.

Klaus talks, talks until he loses track of topics, until he can’t keep his facts straight, or remember the exact reason he’s talking. He supposes he talks to fill the silence because silence denotes a distance between two people. There’s nothing more telling about two people’s relationship than how they sit in silence together, and he’s apprehensive about the verdict for the both of you.

He runs out of things to say, until the only obvious topic is left for an option. It sits on his tongue like a hot coal. He’s uncertain whether addressing it will ease the pain, or increase it, but he’s run dry on conversation, and things to make you laugh- which you have, a couple of times, to his great pleasure -and now he’s only carrying a basket of questions instead of anecdotes.

“Can I ask how the two of you met?” He guesses it’s because his own meeting was so macabre and unexplainable. He’s just curious about what flavor of acquaintance the two of you started on.

“He tried to pickpocket me on the bus for drug money.”

Klaus flinches. Because it isn’t out of the realm of possibility: he’s done so himself, quite a few times.

“Oh,” Klaus fiddles with the rope necklace around his throat, wishing it a noose instead. “ _Tried_ , though?”

A wry smiles hooks your lips, “His hands were shaking. Bad.”

Klaus’ lips spread shakily, from humor, and second-hand embarrassment. Guess the other him was a mess, too. “What’d you do? Hit him with a left hook?” The question makes you turn to scowl at him mockingly, and his smile grows.

You shake your head. “No. I bought him a meal, actually.”

Klaus drops his gaze to his necklace, “Penchant for taking in strays, huh?”

Another shake of your head, “We were just kids, back then. I wanted to know his story, wanted to know if I could help.”

He meets your gaze hesitantly, more than a good deal aware of the irony. “Some things don’t change, seems like.”

You smile wanly. “I wasn’t perfect, I didn’t have all my ducks in an orderly row. I needed help, too.”

Klaus’ eyebrows wrinkle, “You needed help?”

“I was lost, like most kids are that age. In more ways than one; I had people telling me who I was, people asking me who I was, people telling it didn’t matter, and other people telling me it was the most important thing for a person to understand,” You shrug, “Home life was difficult, I had more responsibility than I was prepared to take on- there’s a whole sob story.”

Klaus sits up halfway, resting his weight on his forearms, “You actually going to cry if you tell it?” Half-curious, half joking, the question comes off a bit mocking.

“I’m sure at some point you’ll find out,” A misdirected jab, mostly due to tone. Meant to be teasing, but it lands resolutely in the territory of _bitter._

Klaus’ lips flatten, “I hope I don’t.” Because clearly he has grounds to be irritated with you, grounds to be petty with his words.

You rub a temple, tiredly. “Yeah, me too,” Those years are not worth revisiting. The only redeeming factor in them was meeting Klaus. God, he set your world on fire back then. And not in that romantic, all consuming kind of way. More like _‘Someone call the fire department. There should not be this much fire, ever, in the middle of winter’_.

With a sigh, you ask a question of your own, “What happened to Five? To your Five?”

Klaus frowns at the sudden change of topic. “I told you. Time travelled, got stuck.” When your expression flits from disbelief to concentrated confusion, Klaus cocks his head, “Why? What happened to your Five?”

“Nothing,” You say, chewing the inside of your cheek, “He time travelled all the… _time_.” The end of your sentence falls flatly.

Klaus smiles at the unintentional pun, but sails on, “What are you talking about? Our dad never let him time travel, said it was dangerous- and though it kills me to say it: obviously he wasn’t wrong.” Klaus shudders violently, and gags. “That’s gonna leave an aftertaste.”

You shrug your shoulders, “I don’t know what to tell you. Where I’m from, he’s a stubborn, arrogant, acidic thirty-year-old man with a caffeine addiction.”

Klaus flaps his hand like he’s swatting a fly, “And he just time travels willy-nilly like?”

An uncertain nod is your deliberate answer, along with a one-shouldered shrug. Because shrugging never goes out of style.

Now Klaus sits up, a thought occurring. “So, how did you end up here? And why?”

“I told you-“ You start, shoulders tightening.

“Yeah, you told me ‘an experiment’. But _why_? What was the experiment for and why were you involved?” His gaze is intense, unwavering, but filled to the brim with unbridled curiosity and suspicion.

You’re tempted to lie, that would be easier, in the short run. But you’ve a feeling you’re going to be stuck running a marathon in this world, and fabricating hurdles down the track for an ease of comfort right now is a stupid idea.

“I needed to save someone. Needed to try.” Saying it only reinforces the failure you feel.

And then it hits him, fully. Complete understanding finally dawns on him, unapologetically. It wasn’t just the fact that you were stuck in an alternate reality that made your Klaus ‘ _gone_ ’, it was the fact that in your own world he was gone too. Christ. And then you fall here, to this place, and find him, fucked on drugs and clueless-

Klaus’ face slackens. “I’m sorry you met me. Like this- but mostly just sorry you met me.”

You brave a weak smile, “At least you didn’t try to pickpocket me.”

“I don’t do that anymore,” He admits, equal parts embarrassed and proud.

The simple fact that he used to makes you chuckle. “Because you got beat to a bloody pulp by an old lady’s two grandsons in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven?”

Klaus’ eyes widen to the size of saucers. “Yes. That’s exactly why. Also because it’s immoral.”

You shove his shoulder, “Whatever.” You slide down off the bus, bending your knees on impact with the ground, “Let me ask something personal.”

He jumps down, right in your bubble when you turn around. He pretends he doesn’t see you notice the lack of distance, and hesitate to create more, he pretends he doesn’t want to dwindle it. “Seems only fair.”

He smells like the rain, and stale cigarette smoke, and the inexplicable scent of the city itself. It’s been a long time since those smells have wafted off his skin and longer still that you’ve thought of, and in direct correlation, missed them.

The amount of willpower it takes for your brain to come back to the question you want to ask is pitiful. “Do you ever try to use your ability?”

Not the question he was expecting. He gawks down at you, and then at the inches that divide you because that’s somehow easier to look at, even though it really isn’t. “Nope!”

“You’re still-”

“Traumatized? That _is_ the word you’re looking for. Not ‘scared’ or ‘terrified’ or ‘reluctant’…traumatized. And yes, I am.” He’s practically vomiting the words he says them so fast, and as he throws his gaze elsewhere, mainly up, into the sky, he may or may not be praying for a wormhole to open and throw him into another universe where he never has to have this conversation with you. But instead the sky is azure blue, and sadly empty of space altering black holes. Pity.

“You see Ben all the time, though.” You tuck your hands into your pockets, and wait this conversation out. Aware of the no-no rebuttals, and the ‘too pushy’ options that are far too easy to reach for.

“That’s different,” Klaus says, folding his arms, shoulders hiked, “He’s not all…haunted and screaming.”

“Haunted and-” You bite a smile, thinking back on this exact conversation. And how years later your Klaus told you that Ben had started screeching and wailing at Klaus, mocking his fear. You physically shake your head to get rid of the visual, and stop yourself from looking around to wonder if Klaus’ specter sibling is, at this moment, screaming. You kind of hope he is.

“Not all them are like that,” You inform him patiently.

Klaus rolls his eyes, “I see dead people, Y/N. I’m like Haley Joel, except he got the better deal. Dead people are not as well tempered as Bruce Willis. Unfortunately.”

You stifle another smile, “Okay, okay. Just…how long has it been since you’ve tried?”

Klaus’ jaw stiffens. “Doesn’t matter. Drugs keep them away, even if I could-”

“You can.” You interject, smiling at the minute tick of a vein in his stone-like jaw.

“What’s the point? They’re dead, I can’t do anything for them.”

Now you dawn a knowing expression. “Because you’ve never tried.”

Klaus throws his hands up, “You’re arguing with an unfair advantage.”

You laugh outright, but don’t correct him. “Okay,” You grab his coat sleeve and tug him a few feet forward, though every muscle he has is tensed and wired to snap. The grass is softer where you stop him, taller, and swishes softly in the wind. “Humor me.” You say, laying your hands on his shoulders and pushing him to the ground.

He sits cross-legged, pouting profusely. “Like I have a choice.” He grumbles, but there’s no genuine irritation, it’s just there to cover up the nervousness.

When you kneel in the grass behind him, his instinct is to get up, or to turn. He’s vulnerable, in more ways than one, but only one of those ways is capable of breaking him.

“You trust me?”

The question is quiet, patient, guarded. Because he shouldn’t, should he? He shouldn’t trust you. He doesn’t trust anyone.

“Completely.” He shouldn’t admit that so easy, so readily. He shouldn’t say it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. And he shouldn’t want to ask you the same question to hear your answer. He shouldn’t want your answer to match his. But he does.

His answer throws you. Mostly because you’re expecting a simple yes. It’s what you received ten years ago in this spot, with a younger Klaus that you had known for far longer than this one in front of you. That shouldn’t be his answer, it doesn’t make sense, but you let it be.

He goes still as a statue when your hands once again find purchase on his shoulders. He begins to say something, to ask what you’re doing, but your thumbs dig into his tense shoulders and roll out the discomfort.  

“Relax,” you tell him quietly, “and breathe.”

Breathe, you say, while your hands massage away the tension he holds like a secret. Breathe, when your hands meet the skin of his neck- Christ! Someone else’s hands on him should not feel that good. How gentle, how warm your deft hands are as they diligently work out the knots in his neck. He feels his eyes slip closed of their own accord, more that they lull closed rather than just fall shut, but he won’t admit that he’s been that affected by a simple touch.

Something in his chest shakes, some unidentified muscle, he thinks, something that’s never been there because he’s never felt it until just now- now, when your fingers tunnel up into his hair, rub soothingly at his scalp.

He might be drooling. He’s probably drooling. He doesn’t want to look down to see, terrified you’ll know when his eyes are open and you might stop…terrified to see the exact effect this is having on him.

Back down they go, fingernails grazing teasingly at his scalp, thumbs caressing the shells of his ears, and then around to trace the shape of his jaw- his chin tips up, and he licks his lips, catching escaped saliva at the corner of his mouth. He was drooling.

Christ. No one’s ever been so careful with him, so focused. He would cry if he wasn’t so relaxed. Your fingers rub gentle circles into his temples, and he sighs, in spite of himself. The scent of you washes over him in waves; wildflowers, honey, the slightest hint of laundry detergent, something that reminds him of summer…He groans in the back of his throat.

Your hands coast up, back into his hair, applying the right amount of torque to get his tresses just the slightest bit caught between your fingers: He melts, the last vestiges of his nerves sloping off him at the same time that his shoulders droop, and his head lolls. He’s so far gone, further than drugs have taken him. Ever. And he retreats further into the cocoon of niceness this is: His back meets your chest. His head finds a resting place on one of your shoulders, his neck stretched long, adam’s apple bobbing with each thick swallow he forces down.

One of your hands is still active, tracing the shapes of his face, feather light, attentive. The other rests on his ribcage, the warmth of your palm cutting through the faded t-shirt he’s wearing. Your touch burns in the most delicious way, he wants your hands everywhere.

Mostly, he just wants this moment to stretch into forever, he never wants you to stop.

“Klaus,” His name reaches him on a murmur, hot breath fanning his ear. He’d love to hear it again from you, just like that. But he’s enough hindsight to realize he’s done quite a bit of damage to his willpower.

He creaks his eyes open, and does something infinitely stupid: He looks at you, your profile and the wonderful ways your features culminate to make his heart stop. He spends one second too long looking at your mouth before he lopes his gaze forward, into the grassy field.

And then his heart stops for an entirely different reason: in the center is a girl. Wearing an ugly striped rainbow sweater and whitewash jeans rolled to her calves.

His breath hitches in alarm, gaze riveted on the spirit staring into his own soul. The hand you have on his ribcage coasts over to his middle.

“What? What do you see?” You ask him softly, and you can hear him swallow in response.

“There’s a girl,” He squeaks, unconsciously leaning into you, like he can hide himself in you. He wouldn’t mind one bit. You hum at him, jaw at his ear, and the simple motion grounds him. Relax, and breathe. He does just that.

The ghost outstretches her arm, index finger extended, and he groans. “Oh, I hate when they do that,” He can _feel_ you smile, and takes no offense.

“What?”

He grimaces, fights to hold his grimace when your fingers comb hair around his ear. “Pointing. She’s…pointing. At us.” Shit, you’ve got magic fingers. He can’t math words when you touch him.

“ _Is_ she pointing at us?” you question him emphatically, coasting the backs of your fingers along his jaw.

The right question has been asked. “The bus,” He realizes. “She’s pointing at the bus.”

A little more contact and he can feel your next words form on his ear, “How traumatizing was that, exactly?”

Which thing are you talking about? The creepy ghost-child, or how you’ve turned him into a puddle of man in less than two minutes?

He swallows hard. “Exactly? A mild… _four_.”

Judging by your smirk, it seems you got his pun.

He fights off a tangible whine when you disentangle yourself from him. He feels degrees colder, almost to the point of shock, as if someone has taken him from boiling water and then tossed him into the snow.

He sways when he stands, all his bones confused as to what they’re doing being relied upon. They’re still molten inside him, thank you very much. No, really, thank _you_.

Klaus feels a hand curl around his arm, and resists the urge to turn and grab your own, just to feel you. He shouldn’t do that. It would be all kinds of not good.

He drags a hand through his hair after giving you a nod, and watches you make your way into the bus. And then his gaze is drawn upwards, to the roof where Ben sits cross-legged, the smallest of smirks gracing his mouth. Clearly, he’s witnessed it all.

To stave off the imminent interrogation and teasing, Klaus jerks a thumb over his shoulder in wordless question. Ben nods once. Ghost girl is still standing there.

Klaus hasn’t moved to go inside yet, and there’s no need. You reappear, something dangling from your hand. He opens his hand when you offer whatever it is.

It falls into his hand, a faded mess. A necklace, a locket actually. Two pictures sit inside it, one of the girl, and the other of a woman, older, sharing a lot facial features with the girl. “Her mom?” He muses.

“If I had to venture a guess, I’d say she died on the bus…this is her unfinished business. Probably getting the necklace back to her mother.”

Ben and Klaus share a look, “Died on the bus?”

“There’s a reason the bus is out of commission. It was in a terrible wreck.” When Klaus’ confused expression persists, you roll your eyes, “The other side of the bus is a mess- you didn’t notice the busted windows, bent frame, the unattached seats?”

Klaus puckers his mouth. “Do I look observant?”

“Point.” You concede, patting the air.

“So, now what?” Klaus asks, staring down at the locket in his hand. He wonders if it’s worth anything?

You smile at him, all too pleased for his incoming reaction. “To the library.”

Klaus blanches from head to toe, and whines. “Can’t we just let her stand here for the rest of eternity?” He flops his arms to his side for added effect of childish woe.

You and Ben match looks: unimpressed.

“We could leave _you_ standing here the rest of eternity,” Ben retorts dully, making an executive decision to stand next to you, like a unified front.

“I suppose you can,” You say, and snatch the necklace from his grip. “But I won’t.”

As you walk away from him, direction pointed towards the town, Klaus tucks his hands into his coat pockets. “Well, shit. Like I’m gonna prove everyone right when she’s watching…” he shakes his head and starts after you. He catches a waft of your scent on the wind and turns his nose into his coat collar. Sure enough, the smell of you clings to the faux fur.

Now he’ll never get rid of this coat.

Ben notices. “You like her. More than just friendly admiration, too.” It’s a statement, but he makes it sound like a question.

Klaus hums quietly, neither confirming or denying, which in its own right is a confession. “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

“Oh, of course it is,” Ben smiles, “I’m sure it has nothing to do with how pretty she is, or the fact that she can stand within five feet of you and not wretch.”

Klaus rolls his eyes, “Those are bonuses.”

It’s a long walk back to town, mostly because the buses don’t come out this far during the evening: not enough foot traffic on the outskirts to warrant the trip. Also because he can’t seem to keep his eyes off you, take his focus off things pertaining to you: He’s blocked Ben out, not paying attention to a word coming out of his sibling’s mouth.

He’s fabricating reasons to touch you, to get close. Already, he’s planned to open the door for you at the library, pull out your chair at the projector, sit entirely too near in another chair. Maybe he’ll stand behind you, brace his weight on the arms of the chair…maybe he won’t do any of those things because they sound dangerous. He’s not convinced he’d be able to stop touching you if he started.

Klaus is hoping these subliminal urges will wear off, hoping he can train himself out of wanting them. He’s gone his entire life without you, he _can_ control himself.

“Hey, so,” Ben attracts Klaus’ attention the easiest way he knows: stand right in front of him. Or in this case, walk in front of him. When he’s sure his brother is listening, he talks, delivering news in dead-pan, uncouth fashion. “I think Y/N is haunted.”

Klaus would verbally respond, but you’re within earshot. So, he lets his face do the talking. Eyebrows raised to his hairline translate to: Are you serious?

“Look, spirits give off specific waves of energy, which I can feel coming from her.” Ben slaps a hand to your shoulder: he phases right through, unknown to you. “But she’s alive.”

Klaus’ eyes narrow. He didn’t sense anything when you coaxed him back into his ability- he gets the heebee-jeebies thinking about it -so he’s vaguely unconvinced. He is out of practice, he knows that. But still, if Ben’s right, “Why can’t you see who’s haunting her?” The question is no louder than a whisper, but Ben hears him.

“They don’t want to be seen,” Ben replies, the ‘duh!’ implicit in his tone.

Klaus points at Ben, and mouths, _Useless_. Then he walks right through him, matching your stride. “Hey,” He shoves his hands in his pockets, fingers curled. “What’s next, Sherlock?”

“We search the archives, looking for anything related to that school and tragedies linked to it.”

“We.” Klaus repeats, thrilled you’ve included him in this exclusive team, but disappointed about the work he’s going to have to do. “You got a mouse in your pocket I don’t know about?”

“I have plenty of things in my pockets you don’t know about.” You shoot him a wry smile when he gives you a wary look. “It shouldn’t be too hard, the school didn’t look that run-down, so it couldn’t have happened that long ago.”

Klaus isn’t so convinced. “Mm, that dead girl’s outfit screamed “Mercy!” from the 80s.”

That has your lips pursing, “Let’s hope she was a hipster, then.”

Klaus crosses his fingers on both hands, kisses them, and then extends them skyward. “You’re hanging with me now, Y/N. Your luck has turned to literal shit just by association.”

“I can vouch!” Ben pipes up from behind, hood drawn over his head. He’s content to be a third wheel. Better to watch you, anyway, and see if he can’t riddle something out about this shadowy ghost haunting you.

“Have you done this before?” Klaus asks you, catching on to your certainty and confidence.

“This exactly? No,” You whet your lips. “We started small, when he finally got clean. We’d pick a random place in town and I’d help ease him back into his ability. We tried to help as many as we could, find them some closure.”

You talk like it’s the weather, and not the most selfless, brave thing he’s heard in his life. He can’t believe the other him voluntarily dove back into the darkness and death of his ability. And for what? The slim chance to help someone who’s already dead, someone who can’t repay the favor? Jesus, you’re a force to reckon with because he’s currently doing the very thing he wants to mock.

Klaus raises his shoulders, tucks his chin to his chest. “Yeah? They ever scream at him?”

The insecurity, the fear, it drips from his voice and coats you with pity.

“You think of your ability like an avalanche, and treat it as one. One small noise and the entire mountain collapses on top of you,” You peek at his expression: flat lips and furrowed brow, downcast eyes. No one’s ever worked through his ability with him, not the way he needed. “It’s more like a dam. Held at bay until you choose to let it in little by little. You choose when to open the gate and when to close it.”

“Choose.” He repeats, as if having never heard the word. Choice. His childhood was devoid of that.

“Your choice,” You say, voice firm. He needs to hear that, needs to know it’s always an option, that despite how out of control his life feels, he’s still the one at the wheel.

The topic is getting far too serious and focused on him for his liking. “What are we going to do when we find out what we need to about that girl? What if her mom is dead, or living out of town?”

“If the mother is dead, we’ll have to leave the necklace at her grave. If she’s living out of town, we’ll mail the necklace to her.”

“You’ve got answers to everything.” He jokes, earning a warm smile from you that makes his skin tingle.

Another comfortable silence settles as the two- technically three -of you walk to the library, each of you caught in your thoughts like flies in honey. Klaus’ brain is buzzing with the idea of you, Ben is riddling you out, trying to see this ghost clinging to you like a second skin, and you’re questioning if you really want to go down this road with this alternate version of the man you love.

It’ll be from block one if you do. So far behind on all the meaningful things that need to happen. So many things would need to be said, many things would have to be apologized for. Then again, this Klaus isn’t exactly the same. Life has been different, so he’s different. Everything could be different. If you’d let it.

But you’re still clinging to the naïve hope that you’ll be able to go home, somehow.

The library is as you remember it: big, chromatic, thought-stopping in that the ambience and décor were so dull, your brain would shut off to stop thoughts of suicide from sounding like a fun night out. And glass. So much glass, and too many stairs, not to mention pillars.

Hopefully the layout is the same.

You pull the door. Rather, you try to pull the door, and it does not budge.

Klaus clucks his tongue, and points to said door, at the words on the glass. “Closed today.”

You pull a few more times on the door in frustration. “The audacity.”

Klaus gestures between the two of you. “Shit-luck. Welcome to it.” He grins lopsidedly.

“Guess that girl will have to wait one more day.” You frown loosely.

Klaus shrugs, blasé. “Eh, it won’t kill her.”

You splutter, “Nn- I…I guess it won’t.” He’s too proud of himself for that.

“We need a place to crash. Unless you want to stay awake until tomorrow, walking the streets all night?” Klaus raises his eyebrows, legitimately asking for your opinion.

“Why is the second even an option?” You snip, an eyebrow cocked. “We’ll book a room at a motel for the night.”

Klaus gives you an up-down appraisal. “Damn, money-bags. We gonna eat first?” Another goofy grin is shot your way.

You shake your head, and start down the street, trying to remember where the nearest motel would be. “Happy Monday, Klaus.”

His smile persists. “Happy Monday, Y/N. I can’t wait for Happy Tuesday.”

As the streetlights flicker to life, and headlights on cars cut through the approaching gloom of the night, you feel almost satisfied with the close of your day, few regrets will follow you into tomorrow and for that, you’re grateful.

The smile that pulls your lips wide is genuine, and warm. “Me too.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get complicated, because why wouldn't they? His emotions even more-so. He can't distinguish what's really him and what's really a memory. And what's worse is that he doesn't think you care. And he's never had any semblance of self-control.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, loves. Hope you all are well, enjoy the chapter.   
> Song suggestion: Pim Stones - Neon Lights

The lobby is dismal, claustrophobic, with questionable furniture: the chairs look they couldn’t hold the weight of a phone book, the phone on the wall isn’t even connected, the cord dangles and sways in the breeze of the inconsistent AC. The blinds on the front window are crooked and faded yellow, the brochures on the windowsill are out of date, more than likely most of them advertising businesses that are no longer in commission. The fluorescents overhead flicker, and buzz…

Klaus appraises the lobby, “Not too bad. I’ve seen worse.”

You sigh with your admittance, “Yeah, me too.” The places you’d find and have to drag your Klaus out of…you can’t find any grounds of complaint for this motel.

Klaus wanders to the window and absently paws through the brochures while you head to the front desk. As he glances through one for a nursing home, he steals long looks at you through the reflection of the glass, well knowing he shouldn’t. But hey, he’s a glutton for punishment.

Ben is hunkered down in one of the untrustworthy chairs, arms folded over his chest as he squints at your back and the near invisible waves coming off you. It’s like heat waves, only there’s no temperature, and whereas heat rises, the waves emanating from you radiate outward in all directions. He can’t quite tell what kind of spirit is latched onto you, or why he can’t see them, but he’s determined to figure it out.

Klaus watches your hackles raise in the window, shoulders tighten, and then you drag a hand through your hair- he frowns. The front desk attendant is unconcerned with your stress, he seems generally unconcerned about anything: he’s sat cross legged in an old office chair flipping through an outdated magazine, light reflecting off his bifocals.

“Hey,” Klaus drops the brochure, and stops beside you at the desk. “What’s wrong?” His next move is second nature, though he’s never had a second nature: his hand lands between your shoulder blades, his intent sure and firm.

And you don’t even seem to acknowledge the contact, acknowledge that it shouldn’t be there. “He says he doesn’t have two singles,”

Klaus shrugs, “What about one single? I could sleep in a chair- Hell, even the floor would work, I’ve slept in worse conditions.”

A crease appears between your brows, “I’m not gonna make you sleep on a floor-”

“You renting a room or not, lady?” The attendant asks, licking the pad of his thumb to turn another page.

Klaus bristles, not at the words, but the tone. He narrows his eyes, “Considering your empty parking lot, you’d better hope she is, Stuart Minkus.”

The attendant looks up, the first time since you both walked in, and meets Klaus’ heated stare with a shred of surprise. If he wants to say something in retaliation, he wisely doesn’t.

You’re staring at Klaus even as you direct your next question at the clerk, “What else do you have?”

Stuart Minkus, as he’s been dubbed by Klaus, holds up a key on a weathered leather fob. “A queen. Or you could rent out two rooms-”

Klaus snatches the key out of his hand, smiles tightly. “The queen will do.” Unconsciously, his hand slides up on your back, his grip resting on the rise of your shoulder to your neck.

As you hand over the going rate for the night, Klaus sends one more irritated look at the baffled clerk, slings his arm entirely around your shoulder and then glides out of the lobby with you glued to his side. Ben follows closely behind, eyeing the physical contact between the two of you with a critical- healthy -dose of suspicion.

Klaus’s jaw is tight, near on par with the time he had it wired shut, and he’s not keen to analyze his emotional reaction to someone treating you like you’re a nuisance- The goddamn _gall_ of that clerk!

“What the hell was that?” You ask, as the two- _three_ -of you stop outside the door to your room. “You hangry or something?”

“Or something,” Ben and Klaus say in unison. Klaus mutters it begrudgingly, and Ben says it smugly, which rewards him with a pissy glare from his brother.

You smile at the silent exchange between them, “I wish I could see and hear him. The Ben I know could always make me laugh.”

Klaus untangles himself from you to open the door, “Guess you got the better Ben out of the deal, then. Mine’s just an asshole,” He looks over his shoulder as he walks inside, gaze directed behind you, and he winks, “Said with all the love in the world, brother mine.”

The room is about what you expect: small, sparsely furnished. Some of the furniture looks like it could have come from a yard sale, or was snagged off the sidewalk. The bed looks reliable enough; it’s made at least. There’s a standing lamp in the corner near the window and Klaus turns it on for a better evaluation of the room.

The pillow cases are white, which is surprising considering the lack of employees you’ve seen. The bedspread is old, faded floral and too thick for the start of spring. The walls are cheap wood paneling, the carpet is just on the short side of shag, and a couple shades darker than pea soup. A table stands on the left of the door, one of the legs is missing a rubber cap and so it wobbles; you wouldn’t be shocked to learn if there’s a collection of gum stuck to the underside.

Klaus shrugs again and drops the key onto one of the bedside tables. “It’s not so bad if you don’t look at it so hard.” He drapes his heavy coat over the only chair in the room and peeks out the blinds to stare across the parking lot at the gas station on the other side of the road.

“I’ll take your advice,” You smile wanly, shrugging out of your jacket. “You still hungry?” You perch on the edge of the bed and lean over to untie your laces.

Klaus turns from the blinds and regards you curiously. If he is, why are you taking off your shoes, you’re the one with the money, you have to go get the food. “…yeah.”

You reach back into your jeans pocket and hold out a folded bill to him as you yank the holding knot on your laces out. “I doubt the gas station has anything substantial…”

Klaus pauses where he is, arms dangling at his sides. Are you really just handing money over to him? Trusting him with money? Are you trusting him?

You look up after a few dozen moments pass and find him staring at you like a deer caught in headlights. You don’t see the big deal; it’s a ten-dollar bill, and the gas station is across the street; you can watch him perfectly well from the window.

You sigh softly and sit up straight. “Don’t make me retie my shoes,”

Klaus blinks rapidly, closes and opens his fists, and then nods sharply. “Perish the thought. Anything you hate?” He barely touches the money when he takes it from your hand, pinches it between his fingertips as if he’s expecting it to burst into flames.

You flop back on the bed and stretch your arms above your head. “Stay away from the corndogs, if they have them.”

Klaus tosses you a thumbs up, and hovers uncertainly for a moment, feeling almost like he needs a chaperone because he doesn’t trust himself half as much as you appear to. And then he catches a glimpse of your skin where your t-shirt has ridden up over the rise of your jeans and trusts himself even less for a different reason. He swallows hard and turns on his heel for the door.

It's just ten dollars, and a jaunty little walk across the street. He can manage.

Klaus shoves the money into the front pocket of his too-tight leather pants, puts on a determined face and walks outside. He doesn’t seem to notice the absence of his deceased sibling, caught in his inner monologuing/intense peptalk- nothing filters through his immediate conscience the way it should. He’s far too focused on not letting you down to notice anything out of the ordinary.

Ben is plastered to the window, watching his clueless sibling patter cross the parking lot with a deep furrow between his brow. He can’t leave this shitty motel room, he’s stuck to it, like a fly in honey. His body feels strange, heavy almost, as if gravity is increasing on him exponentially. And he has a feeling it’s because- he looks over his shoulder at you: tottering on the edge of sleep, tired feet twitching -whoever is haunting you has latched onto Klaus.

Ben is the only spirit in the room so he should be free to do whatever he pleases. He’s never been constrained against his own freewill since he’s been dead, and the feeling is so very akin to how he spent his life that his entire being shivers with rejection.

Klaus is usually so pumped full of drugs that he’s as untouchable to the spiritual side of the world as the next person, but he’s coasting the descent, layers of grog falling off his mind like paint in the summer: flaking away, bit by bit.

Which is why this spirit is effectively able to cling to Ben’s brother, beyond his awakening sixth sense. Ben isn’t sure the spirit is malevolent anymore than he’s sure that it isn’t. The only peace he finds is that spirits aren’t able to interact with the physical world unless channeled through a medium; and Klaus is so out of practice that he’s practically mundane.

Still, Ben stands reluctant vigil at the motel window, staring intently at his witless sibling.

Klaus blinks in the overbearing glow of light off the windows and suspiciously clean tile floor, breathes in the sharp tang of cheap disinfectant and scented aerosol. That money sits in his pocket like a sharpened knife, i.e. not well. He wants it out, out of his hands, out of his mind, out of his responsibility.

The hair on the back of his neck stands on end, and the lights glare intrusively: he squints on his way down an aisle, restraining himself from guarding his eyes. There’s a migraine brewing within his cranium, starting at the base of his skull: a throb sits there heavily, pressing on his spinal column like a stone.

Despite the gooseflesh littering his arms and neck a bead of sweat slides down his temple. He stops at the end of an aisle and grips the edge of a shelf. This is not withdrawal. This is life, weaseling its way back into him like a snake in a garden slithers between the slats of a fence. This is part of him, a spare part that’s intrinsic to his identity, but not to what he wants. A missing piece of himself, searching for the blank spot that it belongs in.

He’s spent years filling it with bad habits, trying to kill it. But it’s always been there, lurking on the edge of his peripherals like a hungry predator, waiting for a moment of weakness to pounce and claw itself back in.

A light flickers above him, electricity crackling as it struggles to illuminate. Klaus shakes his head and reminds himself of why he’s here, and convinces himself that the sooner he gets back, the better he’ll feel.

He’s being responsible: he’s going to buy water, avoid sugar- if he can -get you something close to ‘substantial’. Luck is miraculously on his side tonight: these are the lowest prices he’s ever witnessed in a gas station. If he’s uncharacteristically smart he can buy a lot of snacks for you both.

Klaus rubs at his stinging eyes on the way to the refrigerated section in the back of the store, smearing the kohl rimming his deep greens. He’ll take a shower when he gets back, he thinks. He’s in need of one, and the hot water will hopefully chase away the chill gripping his bones like a vice. As he reaches for the handle of the door, he stops suddenly, eyes locked on the murky glass fogged with cold.

There’s a silhouette behind him, unmoving, and dark as pitch in the reflection. He realizes the chill he feels is most definitely not withdrawal, or the AC. Fear skitters up his spine like a startled animal climbing the trunk of a tree.

He’s being haunted. Usually he’s numb, but his last pick me up was this morning after the diner, and he’s slowly but surely sobering up. He doubts that dipping back into his ability helped to keep the dead off his tail.

Warily, he looks over his shoulder, half expecting something tragic and grisly to be looking at him with cold eyes. But there’s no one there, and that makes the chill in him dig deeper. The only cashier in the store is too busy untangling a pair of headphones to notice Klaus’ strange behavior.

Klaus grits his teeth, a drawn out squeaky whimper trapped in his throat. He throws the door open and grabs two waters. When the door closes that silhouette is at his shoulder, looming. “ _Jee-sus_.” He exhales sharply. He’s found himself in a low budget horror film and isn’t keen on being the main character.

His knees lock, and the world seems to tilt on its axis. Distance distorts, the space between himself and the refrigerator elongates impossibly, the lights dim, and his breath is stuck in his chest. Something is happening, something that’s never happened to him.

Usually he can run, force them away, shut the door on the connection he has to the dead- but he can’t this time, and he’s terrified.

The world mutes, as if he’s been shoved underwater, his lungs burn and his mind goes blank. He’s whisked away…

_There’s no patter of rain on the windows, which he anticipates because it rained all night and beat on the panes so loud he couldn’t fall asleep. You didn’t have any trouble, you’re dead to the world, rolled on your side and breathing deeply. He watches the curve of your silhouette rise and fall with your breath, and resists the urge to touch you. He doesn’t want to wake you, even though he really does._

_But you need to sleep, and he needs to let you have it._

_The apartment is cool, just on the side of unbearable due to the open windows on the far side. Moonlight cuts slivers across the wood, contrasts the colors of furniture, deepens the pockets of shadows that during the day don’t exist._

_And that’s very much a fitting comparison to your lives: during the day everything is open and cheery, and nothing gritty exists that can’t be brushed away with a wet cloth. The night is a different story, the night is when he realizes just how difficult it all is, how very real and unforgiving life really is._

_The ceiling is where he throws his thoughts, imagines they stick to it like wet spaghetti. He wonders what it is about the closing of the day that makes everything feel vulnerable. Why he has to measure his words and actions like they’re the trigger for a bomb. And why all the words you say to him before you both fall asleep sound like apologies masquerading as accusations._

_Goosebumps flash over his arms, and he glances at you, curling up tight on the other side of the bed. He wants to wrap himself around you, get so close he can’t tell where he ends and you begin, he wants to lose himself in you like he used to; but it takes effort now and that worries him._

_He slips out from the underneath the blankets, shivers in the cold, and tucks the bulk of the blanket around you, careful to not wake you. For a moment he hangs there: watching you sleep, at peace for the first time in months, and feels a mixture of relief and guilt seize his heart._

_Life has taken a hard left turn for the both of you lately, and neither one of you were prepared for it. Doubts and worries have settled in like a guest upon your furniture: out of place but content to stay. The days are long now, and sprinkled with tight smiles, and tighter embraces, as if in preparation for tragedy. He wonders, sometimes, if the two of you will last, and then he hates that he wonders._

_He rakes a hand through his hair and wanders to the window, taking a cigarette off an accent table, along with a lighter. The wind is frigid and cuts him to the bone, but it’s nothing to the ache he feels when he looks in the general direction of the bedroom, where you lay, so close but entirely out of reach; he hates himself for that._

_He still loves you. That hasn’t changed. Won’t change. What’s changed is how. He has to fight for it, and not because of himself. It’s you. You won’t let him. And he knows it isn’t because you don’t love him; he knows you do. He’d feel it if you didn’t._

_As Klaus smokes the last cigarette of a month old pack, he sighs to himself and his cowardice, his helplessness. Once upon a time he was scared to love you: scared that he might taint you, ruin the goodness inside you. Worried he’d squander your love._

_Now, now he’s scared it won’t be enough. Moonlight glints off the metal on his finger and he stares at the unassuming jewelry, patiently waiting for something to happen. The first year is supposed to be the hardest, right? It was supposed to be. The first year was a breeze, near perfect, never a cloudy day. This second year has been a right bitch and torn at the seams of your relationship._

_A browning cactus sits on an end table a few feet from the window, cast in shadow by a pile of books and Klaus rolls his eyes. Leave it to you to kill a succulent. He calls you the Black Death for it sometimes, and it always rewards him with a pillow thrown at his face. Or a book._

_He picks up the shriveling plant and deposits it on the windowsill, “Good luck, buddy. God be with you ‘cause you’re stuck with her all day.”_

_Even with all the turbulence of this past year Klaus can’t help but to find that the things he’s loved you for, still make him love you. And that means enough to convince him to keep trying. You’re the only thing in his life worth the effort, worth the pain._

_He’s halfway through his cigarette but he tosses it out the window and braces his hands on the brick, forehead on the cold glass as he thinks and rationalizes, and chokes down the tightness in his throat._

_It begins to rain again while he’s standing there, and the temperature drops beyond something he can tolerate. But he leaves the window open because the both of you always leave the windows open. Always._

_The world is fucking terrifying, and ruthless, and out for the both of you. He wonders when it became Klaus against the world, Y/N against the world and not just simply ‘Us’ against it all. He wonders when it all became a fight and stopped being life. Thing is, he’d rather fight with you than live without you but-_

_He stares at the dark shape of the bed and narrows his eyes._

_-He’s pissed that it’s become one or the other._

_Klaus thinks back to this morning when he emptied the trash in the apartment: the kitchen, the bedroom, the wastebasket in the bathroom, and stopped there, staring down into that beat-up wicker basket with his heart in his stomach. It had broken him hours ago, seeing those plastic disappointments on their way to the dump. Now he’s incensed that they’ve held so much sway._

_Nothing’s changed. You’re still what he wants more than anything in this world, and to be denied of you because three plastic sticks say ‘no’…_

_He rubs a hand down his face. There was an ocean between you because while he was trying to simply love you, you were trying prove something- to yourself, you never have to prove yourself to him -trying to find pieces of a puzzle he thought was already complete._

_You have work in the morning, and so does he. But this is important. You’ve slept enough, hugged the edge of the mattress and avoided his affection longer than he can stand. A bed shouldn’t feel like an ultimatum, like a sentence. He’s dreaded laying down in it for months. It hasn’t been a bed to him: it’s been a bear trap. And no matter what he’s done, he always manages to tap the trigger._

_Tonight he sees it for what it is, and is ready._

_When he slides back in the sheets have gone cold, the indent of his body has begun to smooth out, and you’re still just as deep in sleep as you were when he first left. He doesn’t hesitate to touch you this time, to refamiliarize himself with the way you feel against him, each curve and edge fitted to his own. This is where the difference is made known: right before you wake up and your body responds as it knows to, as it wants to, as it remembers. You melt into him, and he covets that softness, that vulnerability. And then you stir in his arms._

_And the trap snaps shut around his heart when he feels your shoulders stiffen, spine straighten against him. Christ, how long has it been since he’s just_ held you?

_“What’s wrong?” You ask him quietly, ribcage barely moving._

_He buries his face in the back of your neck. Something has to be wrong for him to touch you now? He’s honest, because nothing honest, or anything of import has been said these last few months and he’s physically sick with how far apart the two of you have coasted. “I’ve missed you. Still do.”_

_It’s some time before you muster a response, he’s worried you won’t supply one the silence stretches for so long._

_“I’m here.”_

_But you’re still stiff against him, barely drawing breath, and you haven’t moved to touch him. His hand glides up your side, he feels your skin tremble, and lands on your ribcage. He squeezes just enough for the implication to not be lost when he says, “No. You’re not.”_

_The quietest of catches in your breath let him know he’s onto something meaningful. He breathes in the scent of your shampoo, lifts his head to mumble into the skin of your cool neck, “I’ve missed you.” And this time it hits home: every inch of you goes slack in his embrace and the breath leaves you in one giant sigh._

_“I’m sorry,” you tell him, and it’s genuine and small._

_He pulls you closer, until he can feel you enough to match his breathing to your own. “Don’t be sorry. Just be you.”_

_He hears you swallow. “And what does that mean?”_

_Klaus smiles, shimmies a leg between yours and begins to find his way back to the core of who he is. “It means slide across our hardwood floors in your knee socks. Cry over terrible black and white films, leave open books wherever you can fit them. Sing off key in the shower,” His hand drifts up after dipping under the hem of your sleep shirt._

_“I’m not off key,” You weakly protest, turning your head to get glimpse of his face. He’s grinning, cat-like, eyes twinkling at you._

_“Kill every potted cactus in our apartment, leave sappy poetry on every piece of paper you can find, never stop throwing pillows at me when I call you a plant murderer- those eyes, roll ‘em at me. Because I know you don’t mean it.” He’s properly smug with a just a hint of sugar sweetness._

_“No? You sure?” You quip back, intent to focus on his voice and his words rather than his hand which is continuing its heavy, slow journey north._

_He rises up, up on his forearm in the pillow your head is on, his fingers comb hair away from your face. “Bet my life on it.” His hand rests on your sternum, feeling your heart beating under his palm like a drum._

_Even during a heart-to-heart you can’t sacrifice your sass. “Good thing you’re not a betting man, then.”_

_Just another thing he loves about you. “Do everything you always do that makes me fall in love with you. Every. Single. Day.” Anything else he could say, might say, he drowns against your mouth. And anything he would do he cuts down to the simple act of covering your body with his own._

_It’s a testament to how well you know each other that after months of avoiding intimate contact you can fall back into the familiarity, find your way back to the fire._

_The shirt really isn’t in the way, but he tears it off you anyway. He wonders if he’ll even get the sweats he’s wearing off his body before-_

_He’s on his back, dazed, staring up at you as you straddle him, expression intense. Why he thought this would be vanilla and soft he has no idea. He could roll his eyes at himself. You bend down and kiss him breathless and he’s in no hurry for air. When you grind against him, he grunts, lifts his hips and tries as best he can to shed the material strangling him._

_It happens almost too fast: his erection is freed, he cups a hand to your face and breaks off to tell you to slow down (he doesn’t get the chance), and you effortlessly center yourself and sink down on him._

_He loses his breath in a hiss that turns into a belly-deep groan, expression slack as you take every inch of him. “Fuuuuck. Y/N.” He says your name in scolding, swallows thickly and doesn’t really have the heart to glare at you. You plant a hand on his abdomen, he flexes in preparation, and grabs one of your hips, gaze drawn suddenly to the metal band adorning his left ring finger and he’s overtaken with it: “I love you.”_

He crashes back, a migraine splitting his skull. No, that’s not it. His jaw hurts like hell…

“Hey, Klaus, you okay?”

He refocuses, drawn to you through molasses. Your hands are curled in the fabric of his shirt, eyes wide in concern. He’s in shock, honest to goodness shock. Until you touch him, and then he’s on high alert. Your hand touches the side of his face, and he whimpers, drops the bottles of water in his hands and steps back. Which does nothing to create space because you’re anchored to him, still gripping his shirt.

His hands hover, shaking like a leaf in the wind over your own. He needs space, space away from you because if you touch him again he might…he might. His body blooms with heat, and he’s trembling from head to foot. All he can manage to say is: “Let go…”

He’s pale, running with sweat: the collar of his t-shirt is soaked and his pupils are blown wide. His hands still hover uncertainly over your own.

“Okay,” You relent, and release him. The moment you do he back peddles about five feet and heaves a sigh. “Are you alright?” You ask him, torn with yourself.

He rakes both hands through his hair, and looks at you with heavy eyes. “Not really, no.” Klaus rubs at his arms and looks the line of refrigerated doors at his side, wary to see a silhouette. But there’s nothing. He turns away and clenches his eyes shut, hands landing on the back of his neck.

He was wide awake this time when the memory hit, and that scares him. Something is happening to him and whatever it is, it’s getting worse. Getting stronger. He can’t live like this. The other side of the world is making its way back to him and he doesn’t want it.

He needs to shut it away, close it all up back in the box he had it in.

He needs to be numb. But he’s skint broke.

“Klaus?”

Don’t you sound so concerned? Maybe you’re getting mixed up too? Christ, this is dangerous. Being around you is dangerous, it’s just sunk in. But what’s he going to do? Walk away from you? …maybe.

He hears you approach him and whirls back around, palms out and at chest level. “I’m okay, sort of. Just- don’t touch me, hm? Whatever you do.” His voice wobbles, he sounds on the edge of hysterics. He digs in his pocket for that ten-dollar bill and holds it out toward you at arm’s length. “I’m not hungry. Get whatever.”

The second you take it he’s walking briskly out of the gas station without a backwards glance. He can feel your eyes on his back. The motel room is a god-send, empty as it is, save for his sibling.

Klaus stops whatever Ben’s going to say upon entry with a comment of his own. “What weird shit happened to you while I was gone?” Klaus is dancing on the precipice of sober and his mind is slowly finding its footholds.

“I was trapped in here…you?”

Klaus nods, shrugs, and glances at the end table. Your cellphone, loose change, and that locket rest upon it. “Oh, weird sex dream/vision/memory…thing.”

Ben’s facial features flatten. “Are you shitting me?” he sounds extremely put-off.

Klaus flops down on the bed, squints into the light from the lamp and then reaches up to tap it off. The room is dim, quiet, but tense. “You think the old man could figure something out?” The words sound hollow coming out of him.

Ben straightens in his seat, and peers at Klaus critically. “Do you want him to?”

Klaus doesn’t answer. Mostly because you just opened the door, and are now standing on the threshold uncertainly, staring at him. He stares at the ceiling.

“What was it this time?” You ask, shutting the door behind you. You dump the plastic bag of junk food on the table and attempt to keep your eyes on his face and not on the skin that’s teasing you beyond the upturned hem of his shirt.

Klaus quirks a weak smile and sits up, his back to you. “You’d just punch me again.”

“Oh.” Coffin nail.

He looks over his shoulder at you. “You can if you want to. Match this side.” He taps his bruised jaw emphatically.

You pinch the bridge of your nose, shake your head. “Are you a masochist?” You ask, just for something to say.

Klaus snorts. _Sometimes I wonder._ He stands, “ _I_ am going to take a shower. Wash this off.” He waggles his hands at himself, the meaning lost in the words. What he’s meaning to wash off, he doesn’t know.

“Wait, we’re not going to talk about it?” You match him stride for stride on the way to the bathroom, his shoulders hike up.

 “You don’t want to.” He retorts, and then realizes that leaves an avenue open. “I don’t want to.”

“I-” You’re flabbergasted. “You don’t think we should?”

“I don’t think there’s a point.” His voice is raising octaves because you are still hot on his tail and he doesn’t know how close he can bear you being. He grips the doorknob, hopes it’s a push and not a pull.

“Maybe- wait.” You grab him at the crook of the elbow, forgetting his feeble request at the gas station. Though, the reason behind it is vague, as if you could’ve known the outcome.

The contact- it robs him of control. He still has those emotions riding his system, he still has the feel of your bare skin lingering within the tips of his fingers, warmth of your flesh on his palms, hip bones nestled within his grip. Vocal chords tripping, breaths chopped in half, moonlight spilling in the background as you rise and fall upon him. He feels not only possessive of you, but the fact that you aren’t his doesn’t make it passed what he feels in this moment.

And what he feels is so strong for you he can’t fight for the truth.

He has you against the door, pressed flush to him, fitted to his body so smoothly it’s like poetry. There’s no hesitation when he crushes his mouth to your own, tips your head back with a hand on your neck and nips at your lips until you open to him and then he rightly devours you and any sense you might have about what’s happening.

Your hands burrow themselves in his hair, fist his short locks and he grunts so much like your own Klaus that., for a moment, you believe it. You’re hiked up the door, surprised by the strength in his arms, his hands grip your thighs so tightly you can feel the way they shake against you.

He feels, smells and tastes exactly the way you remember; you’re not ready to end this reprieve. Your hands grab his jaw, smooth, but slicked with sweat and angle his head up to rain stinging kisses under that stretch of bone, nip and bite just so you can hear him groan.

And groan he does, his eyes flutter open, skate across the grimy ceiling and he remembers with red hot dread where exactly he is. _Who_ he is. “Y/N,” he says, at war with himself.

“I know,” You mumble into his jaw, and then readjust, forehead pressed to the bone, and hands on his shoulders. You listen to each other breathe, regret. Count the seconds.

You can feel a smile twitch his lips. “Told you not to touch me,”

“Yes you did,” You sigh, hands sliding around to the back of his neck, so that when he finally lets your feet touch the ground your hands are twined around him. Eyes closed, you lean into him, and selfishly cherish the way his own arms wrap around you.

“I’m sorry,” He murmurs, tilting his head against your own, breathing in the scent of you, trying to ignore the taste he has of you in his mouth, tries to ignore how badly he wants-…just that. He tries to ignore how strongly he wants.

“Don’t be,” You tell him, relishing the scratch of his facial hair along your temple, his breath flutters in your ear.

“Just be me, right?” It’s the wording, and the softness, and the guilt that tells you how he really feels about the entire situation. It’s an apology, even though it isn’t.

You laugh wetly, and curse the sting of your eyelids. What a bastard.

He leans back just a bit so you can see his sincerity, his sympathy, his lack of judgement. And he’s an idiot for it, because each time he looks at you he loses resolve, he loses the sense of who he is and instead laments who he’ll never be. Even with tears brimming in your eyes he feels fortunate, blessed.

What a force of nature, what an answered prayer to a prayer he’s never uttered you are.

He’s not sure he could leave you, but-

“God, I wish I knew if what I feel for you is me, or…” He gingerly tucks hair behind your ear and lets his sentence trail off as he openly admires you. The backs of his fingers ghost along your jaw.

“Or if it’s the memories.” You finish for him, staring up at him and his green eyes which wander your face with far too much affection. It’s strange, looking at him, you know he isn’t yours. But if you close your eyes, breathe in the scent of him and lean into his exhales, like right now…he could be your Klaus.

His fingers tip your chin and you open your eyes to find his softened greens regarding you tenderly. There’s a moment, a single fleeting moment that stretches out into forever where you can see the pitfalls of the next. You’ve a choice.

A decision to make. One you’ve made a thousand times. A choice. The same choice.

There’s plenty of time to stop this, end it before it begins. But you don’t.

This time it’s slower, softer, as if for the first time. Cautious and gentle, like he’s worried about spooking you. At any moment you could decide this is a mistake; it most likely is a mistake. But damnit…he should kiss you at least once of his own volition. No overwhelming feelings taking the helm. Just him.

But-

Your arms tighten around his neck, pull him in closer, deepen the kiss.

-it seems he’s the only one that’s fighting overwhelming emotions. What did the other him say: _Why he thought it would be vanilla and soft he has no idea._ Sounds about right. He hears metal jangle, grind together and the bathroom door swings open. His eyes widen, but he’s getting ahead of himself.

Your hands grip his t-shirt, turn…and you shove him into the bathroom. “Take your damn shower!” you say, slightly dazed, flushed.

Klaus stares at you in the middle of the bathroom, shocked silent. And then that little shit remembers he has a personality. He grabs the hem of his shirt and lifts it over his head, winking at you before he disappears behind the material. The slamming of the door is your nonverbal response. He laughs loudly at your expense, and then laughs harder when he hears you chuck something at the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts, dear friends?


End file.
